


Incipit

by Guede



Series: The Marriage of Heaven and Hell [10]
Category: Football RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Angels & Demons, Angst and Humor, Crack Treated Seriously, Demon Hunters, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fallen Angels, Guilt, Incubus Cristiano, Interspecies Relationship(s), Loss of Virginity, M/M, Magic, Miscommunication, Moving On, Multi, Pack Dynamics, Polyamory, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Unrequited Love, Worldbuilding
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-17
Updated: 2016-03-17
Packaged: 2018-05-27 07:03:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 28,388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6274507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Guede/pseuds/Guede
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Cristiano has a plan.  Kaká doesn’t, but he has an angel at home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Incipit

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written and posted in 2011.

“I don’t trust you,” Cesc said, eyes narrowed.

Cristiano stared back, eyes just as narrow and hard. Then he put his hands on his hips and tossed his head back in a laugh. He shook his head, still snorting, and rubbed at his mouth with one hand. “Really?”

“Really,” Cesc said irritably. He leaned against the jamb, his arms crossed over his chest. Then he flicked the fingers of his left hand at Cristiano’s clothes. “And dressing up like some kind of runway whore isn’t going to get you any points with me.”

“Runway whore?” Incredulous, Cristiano looked down at himself. Khakis, skin-tight grey cashmere sweater, a watch so loaded with diamonds that it could probably be used deflect lasers. Then he shrugged and looked up, past Cesc at something inside of the store. “Do you call your friend that too?”

Cesc glanced over his shoulder, then sighed as he spotted Villa shelving some books. It figured that they’d shop at the same—he whipped back around, sensing movement, and jabbed his finger at Cristiano just as the other demon began to advance. “Look, you’re not getting in.”

Cristiano sighed. “Don’t tell me it’s because I’m an incubus. I just do my job, same as you. Except I get to do it in luxury hotels and Jacuzzis.”

“No, it’s because you’re an incubus who’s known to screw over other demons and I can’t think of a single reason why you’d want to talk to us except to screw us over, too,” Cesc snapped. He pulled his head back so that he was fully behind the bookshop’s wards and put his hand on the doorknob. He didn’t miss the sudden flicker of nervousness across Cristiano’s face. “Besides, you also hang out with that weirdo Kaká, and he’s like a walking apocalypse trigger. That’s enough of a reason right there for me to—”

“It’s about him,” Cristiano said, suddenly pushing forward. His hand fritzed on the wards, but he just waved it a few times to get rid of the smoke and then put it up on the jamb. He leaned forward and dropped his voice. “He’s got demon lords after him.”

Cesc pulled a mock-look of shock, then rolled his eyes. “Oh, my God, when _doesn’t_ he? So what? He’s not our problem.”

Cristiano jutted his head forward and for a moment Cesc thought the jerk was going to try and barge through the wards anyway. But then Cristiano just sighed and tilted his head back. He muttered to himself, ran one hand through his hair and checked his reflection in the store window. Then he looked back down at Cesc, his lips thinning out in an oddly serious, determined expression. “He’s _your_ fucking problem if those lords figure out how to use him to bridge the planes so they can come up whenever they want, without having to wait around for a portal to open up. I heard your leaders just escaped up here, you know. They really want here to turn into how it was down there?”

“You’re an asshole,” Cesc snapped instinctively. He stepped back from the door, then grabbed the knob and jerked it towards him. Then he jerked it back the other way. He rubbed at his mouth, then heaved a sigh. “Don’t look so smug. I’m just gonna go get Raúl, and see what he has to say.”

“Say about what?” Villa had wandered up and was glowering over Cesc’s left shoulder at Cristiano. “What the fuck is he doing here?”

Cristiano’s brows flew up. Then he pushed back on the hand he had on the jamb and looked down at the ground, grinning. “Oh, just go ask whoever if they want to know about keeping everybody here and not getting dragged back to Hell. Then invite me in.”

“What?” Villa asked sharply. “Who’s dragging us back? You smug fucking son of a bitch, you can’t just show up and start making threats—”

“Just watch him for a moment, all right?” Cesc muttered. He grabbed Villa’s shoulder and shook it to make sure he had the other fox demon’s attention. Then he spotted Silva coming out of the woodwork. He made eye contact with Silva, then nodded at Villa, who was still trying to set Cristiano’s hair on fire with glaring alone. “I’m getting Raúl.”

“I’m watching him, all right.” Villa practically elbowed Cesc out of the way so that he could try and block the doorway with his body. It didn’t really work, but Cristiano didn’t have much grounds to look as amused about it as he did, in Cesc’s opinion.

Then Cristiano made a little dismissive wave of his hand and Cesc almost pushed Villa away so that he could slam the door in the incubus’ face. “Go on, go on,” Cristiano said encouragingly. “Go get—it’s still Raúl? What, Guardiola and Hierro are too broken up to take things back?”

“Don’t strangle him, Guaje,” Silva said, slipping up behind Villa. He put his hands on the small of Villa’s back, within easy hooking distance of Villa’s belt. “He’d just get your hands dirty. Cesc?”

“Going,” Cesc said after a moment. He took a backward step, still looking at Cristiano’s smirk. Then he spun on his heel, grimacing, and headed for the stairs.

* * *

Ricardo woke up just after the sun rose, as was habitual with him. He got out of bed and did a few stretches to wake up mind and body, and then knelt by the side of the bed for his morning prayer. Then he went to the bathroom and washed his face and his hands. He paused for a moment, looking at his damp face in the mirror. He touched one of the bags under his eyes, then sighed and reached for his comb.

When he’d finished dressing, he went back into his kitchen to make himself breakfast. Despite all his travels with Lilian, Ricardo had only recently begun to progress beyond very basic cooking skills; Lilian had always seemed to have some friend in town, or had managed to talk a local into donating a meal to them. And before that, Ricardo had gone from his family to the seminary, which had had a cafeteria. The seminary that was currently hosting them also provided them with meals, but they were intended mainly for those who lived in its dorms, and since Ricardo had moved out, he didn’t feel as if it was fair of him to continue to eat there.

Ricardo was washing up the dishes when he heard something. It was a soft sound, a little like someone tapping the wall, but he nearly dropped his plate. He whipped his head up, then hissed under his breath and caught the plate just before it would have shattered. Then he stood in front of the sink, not even breathing. But all he heard was the running water.

After another moment, he ran the soapy plate under the faucet and then set it in the rack to dry. He wiped his hands off on a towel, which he also used to mop up the splashes on the counter. Then he hung the towel on its bar and went up to the roof.

His current place was on the outskirts of the city, the top apartment in a building and neighborhood where his budget would stretch to such a pick. He’d needed the roof.

As usual, Andriy was perched on the far corner, staring at the dawn. His shoulders lifted a little as Ricardo opened the door, but that was the only sign he showed that he knew Ricardo was there. If Ricardo spoke to him now, he would answer, and with no apparent irritation. But all Ricardo could ever think to ask at these times was whether the angel hurt and how badly Andriy missed Heaven, and even without any inflection in his voice, Andriy could make Ricardo regret asking about such things. So Ricardo let the angel be, till the sky had lost its vibrant colors and shaded to a pale blue.

“I had a visitor,” Andriy abruptly said.

Halfway across the roof, Ricardo started sharply. He reached forward, then put his hands at his sides and took a deep breath. Then he slowly crossed the rest of the roof. Andriy kept staring out over the town.

“A visitor?” Ricardo finally asked. “Today?”

Andriy glanced up at Ricardo. Then he swung his legs back over the edge of the roof and climbed down off it, graceful in the same careless, half-destroyed way that a drunken man could be graceful. “About ten minutes before you came up. An angel. They wanted to speak with me about what I might do now.”

Ricardo instinctively glanced around them. He didn’t sense any presence now, and more disturbingly, didn’t sense any trace of a past one. Whoever it’d been must have been quite powerful. “Did they threaten you?”

For some reason Andriy laughed. He looked at Ricardo for a moment and his eyes were fond, but also strangely distant. “You think more like a soldier than I ever did.”

“Which one was it?” Ricardo asked more quietly, after a long moment. He caught himself rubbing his hands against his hips and made his fingers flatten. Then he noticed a slight movement from the angel and stepped back, thinking that Andriy wanted to pass him. He pursed his lips. “Do…do you want to discuss it?”

“If you want,” Andriy said neutrally. He ran one hand through his hair, looking over his shoulder. Then he turned around and began to walk slowly towards the door, his eyes restlessly sweeping over the ground.

A flash of irritation went through Ricardo. He pressed his lips together, then made himself breathe out. Then he shook his head and jogged forward till he caught up with Andriy. It was unfair of him to expect Andriy to react as a human would, and Andriy certainly owed no duty to Ricardo to…to satisfy his selfish need for a show of emotion. It wasn’t even about him anyway, except for the role he’d played in precipitating Andriy’s decision to Fall, and as Lilian had rightfully pointed out, none of them but Andriy truly knew what that role was.

Whatever that was, somehow it seemed as if Andriy should be more upset about it. Then Ricardo shook his head again, frustrated with his drifting thoughts. He nodded absently at Andriy’s holding the door for him, then hissed at himself and looked up sharply. “I don’t—”

“I don’t think they’re going to try to kill me now, though it’d be easier for them,” Andriy said in a calm tone. He was looking straight at Ricardo, with a steady and unblinking gaze. “I did finally leave, and now neither side can call on me. So there’s no need.”

“They’ve never gone after the other fallen angels that live in this city, Figo’s told me,” Ricardo blurted out. He leaned on the door, then shifted his weight away when the door, not the sturdiest, began to wobble on him. Then he stepped into the hall so that the door swung shut behind him. “It’s only been demons. But I don’t know if they’ve gone to see the other ones.”

Andriy shrugged. “You can ask.”

“So you don’t know?” Ricardo’s voice rose considerably more than he would have liked and he grimaced. He slipped his right hand into his pocket so that he could twist two fingers in the rosary coiled there. “That is, do you want to know?”

A thin line grooved itself between Andriy’s brows. “Who comes to see us after we’ve fallen? I think I’ll find that out soon enough.”

“I understand, but if there’s some sort of danger involved, then I could ask and see if it’s happened before. And then we’d be better prepared,” Ricardo said, failing badly at hiding his irritation. “Do you _care_ about that?”

“If they’re going to come, they’re going to come no matter what Paolo or Sandro or Gianluigi say. You can’t stop them,” Andriy replied after a long moment. He was…politely confused, similar to the way Lilian often took Ricardo’s insistence on using forceful tactics against demons. “Kaká.”

Ricardo started out of his growing exasperation. He stared at the angel for a moment. His hand rose of its own accord and then he put it back by his side. Then he lifted it towards Andriy, only to curl in his fingers when Andriy looked at them. He opened his mouth while still failing to remember what he should say in response. Andriy usually didn’t call him by his name.

“I was in Hell.” Suddenly Andriy’s eyes were raw and brutal, like still-bleeding wounds. Then a kind of placidity slid over them like panes of frosted glass, muting them to the point that their expression bore the same relation to the previous pained gaze that an illustration in a medical textbook did to a disease. He smiled. “I do remember that now. It makes it hard to care about what they might threaten me with after that.”

“But what if they try to drag you back?” Ricardo asked. Before he could help himself, he’d taken a step forward and had seized Andriy’s left wrist. He thought, inanely, that perhaps he could will some of his urgency into the angel that way. “Even if they can’t think of a worse torture than what you suffered before, what you’ll be subjected to still will be—will be horribly painful—”

“I wasn’t talking about when I took your sin on myself, and went to the plane you call Hell,” Andriy interrupted. For a moment his eyes cooled and he was almost upset with Ricardo. But then he sighed, and gently took away Ricardo’s hand. His arm continued in a slow circle up to his head, where it haphazardly combed through his hair as he stared at a point behind Ricardo. “I meant when I first Fell.”

Ricardo shut his mouth. He looked at the ground, then back at Andriy. Then at the ground again, uncomfortably aware of how hot his cheeks felt. He bit his lip.

He looked up again upon hearing movement and found Andriy going down the stairs. When he caught up with the angel, Andriy paused and waited for Ricardo to pass him. Then he unexpectedly put out his hand and touched Ricardo’s arm. It was little more than a graze, but it immediately stopped Ricardo.

“You’re worried,” Andriy said. “Does it really matter that much if you know who might come for me?”

“Yes.” The word burst out with such violence that Ricardo half-expected Andriy to flinch from it; Andriy didn’t, unsurprisingly. Then Ricardo looked away. He felt oddly ashamed of his vehemence. “It—it matters. I don’t want them to take you. And even if I can’t stop them from coming, I might still…”

After a moment, Andriy lowered his arm. “Then go ahead and ask them,” he said, not looking back. “Paolo had some visitors after he chose, I know. He’ll tell you.”

“If you don’t wish me to ask, I’ll respect that,” Ricardo said.

Andriy gazed at him, and behind those placid eyes something seemed to stir. But then Andriy shrugged again, and turned away. “I have no wishes regarding that,” he replied. He looked about the hall with mild curiosity, then glanced back at Ricardo. “Do we have somewhere to go today?”

“No.” Ricardo immediately grimaced. “That is…there’s nowhere you need to go. I…well, I’d like to visit the other angels, as I…”

“All right,” Andriy said. He reached out and pushed open the door to the apartment, then went inside. As he walked, he looked here and there as if he was touring the place for the first time.

They’d been there for nearly two weeks now, and Andriy rarely went farther than the roof. He probably knew the place better than Ricardo, who had to go out regularly to assuage Lilian’s concerns and avoid raising suspicions among the seminary staff. Another sharp flash of irritation went through Ricardo and he had to drop his head and breathe deeply to keep it from showing.

When he looked up, Andriy had disappeared. Ricardo sucked in his breath and darted into the room, only to sigh when he found Andriy looking at him with bemused curiosity from the far corner of the apartment. He muttered some excuse and Andriy nodded, acknowledging it. Then the angel turned around and began to gaze out the window, exactly as he’d done on the roof.

Ricardo pressed his lips together. Then he deliberately turned away. He shut the door to the roof and leaned on it for a few seconds. Then, after a last glance at Andriy, he went to the closet for his coat.

* * *

Cristiano tipped back his chair and swung up his legs so that his feet were resting on the arm of another chair. At the same time, he put his arms over his head and stretched them out, then dropped them with a wide yawn. He worked his jaw a few times, blinking. Then he looked up with an inquiring look on his face. “What?”

“Any time you want to talk about why the fuck we’re letting you sit here instead of kicking your Eurotrash ass out,” Villa said.

If the little furball really wanted to look intimidating, Cristiano had a few suggestions for him. Like not slouching when Cristiano had carry-on luggage bigger than him, and not criticizing Cristiano’s wardrobe when the moron was wearing the same designer sneakers—just one edition older than Cristiano’s. But, Cristiano thought, looking critically at Villa, just a makeover wasn’t going to do it. So no point in wasting his time there.

He turned to the other demons gathered around the table—nobody would confirm for him but Figo was apparently out for the day, and had taken that hawk-demon with him. Raúl was staring at him with no particular expression on his face, while Cesc was trying hard to copy him but was given away by the nervously flicking ears. Morientes was lounging in the doorway, not smiling and providing all the menace necessary, _Villa_. Funnily enough, Cristiano didn’t see any sign of Hierro or Guardiola. Maybe the rumors were right and they were so cracked up they had to be kept locked up.

Well, not Cristiano’s problem either. “So, you know the fuck-up last month?”

“What, when you let your phone get hacked and got Kaká lured out by a demonlord to get Andriy’s wings and break open the Seals?” Cesc snorted.

Cristiano smiled brightly. He spent a moment enjoying the frisson of irritation that went around the table, then leaned forward. “Yeah, that one. You know, I’d think that at this point you guys would know how to handle clean-up on a mess like that, what with Zlatan’s sex life happening ten minutes from here, but—”

“Okay, first of all, you started it and I didn’t see you pitching in,” Cesc snapped.

“Cesc.” Raúl finally decided to act like a figurehead and stared Cesc down till the other fox demon grudgingly closed his mouth. Then he put his hands on the table and stood up so he could better glower down his nose at Cristiano. “We did handle it.”

“No, you didn’t.” Then Cristiano reached into his pocket. He paused, sighed as Morientes, Villa and Raúl exchanged more looks than a drunken wallflower at a wedding trying to guilt somebody into taking her out on the dancefloor. “Just going to show you,” he said, pulling out his hand. “See?”

He set the horn on the table. It wasn’t much bigger than his hand and was bent into a single curl. The base left a sticky residue on his palm and Cristiano had to check his pocket to see if the damn thing had leaked—he thought he’d rinsed it off—only to find to his disgust that it’d actually started to disintegrate and that was what that was from. He’d have to trash the whole outfit; no dry-cleaner in Italy seemed to know what to do about ‘demon fluids’ and well, the coat was what pulled all the other pieces together.

It occurred to Cristiano that he’d been trying to hold a discussion. He looked up to find the other demons staring at the horn with varying degrees of nauseated recognition—Raúl—and confused curiosity—Cesc.

“Where did you get that?” Raúl demanded.

“At the park, where they brought Andriy through,” Cristiano said. He took off his coat and wiped his hand off on it, since it was getting junked anyway. “I went back there, like anybody trying to do a cover-up should, and by the way, the earth’s still crisped up so nothing’s growing. Way to keep the local teenagers away from Satanic rituals.”

Villa made a face that was half-disgusted, half-puzzled. “Since when do we care about that?”

“Oh, sorry. I thought you were like me, and at least sending down the occasional soul so they don’t notice you’ve pretty much gone rogue on everything else. My mistake.” Cristiano paused, then pointed at Raúl. “But that’s going to make them even more pissed off, isn’t it? Between your soul supply drying up and lifting your lords out of Hell, you’re practically angels now—”

“There’s no need to be insulting,” Raúl finally said. He stared at the horn another moment, then had to visibly lift his head. He set his shoulders back. “You wouldn’t be coming to us if you didn’t need to. So you have a stake in stopping this too.”

After a moment, Cristiano figured he might as well nod to that. “True enough. So, someone want to come with me to go see Ricky?”

“Not really,” Villa muttered. Then he glanced at Raúl, who was still staring straight at Cristiano and who hadn’t made any signal that Cristiano could see. He pressed his lips together, then got up. “I’m coming. We’ve already got somebody there—we’ve had somebody watching him since before your fucking mess, since he’s so good at making enemies who like invoking demonlords. Get up, we’re going now.”

“Hey, tell Silva I’m done with his _Sons of Anarchy_ set,” Cesc said to Villa as Villa passed behind him.

Judging by that and by how Morientes abruptly disappeared into the hall, it seemed like the meeting was over, but Raúl hadn’t gotten up yet so Cristiano stayed where he was. For another few seconds, Raúl just looked at him, as if that was supposed to do something. If there was supposed to be a spell involved or something magical like that, the fox demon probably needed to check his casting, because Cristiano didn’t even feel a tingle.

Then Raúl abruptly rose. Everybody stopped and looked at him, but he just muttered that he’d see Cristiano when they came back and then went out of the room. Cristiano blinked in surprise: he’d expected more of a grilling than that.

Well, he wasn’t going to question his luck. He got up, ignoring Villa’s snipe about whether he needed to powder his nose before they went out, and picked the horn up from the table. After wrapping that in his coat, he stuck the whole package under his arm and followed Villa out of the room and outside into an alley behind the store.

Cristiano had come up with ten different excuses why he’d need a moment by himself then, but Villa saved him the trouble by getting into an argument with another fox demon on the way out. When Villa’s head was turned, Cristiano turned the coat and horn into ash and let the grey flakes drift over a convenient pile of newspapers bundled for the garbage. A couple pokes with his foot and the ashes sifted nicely in between the bundles and out of sight.

“Leave that alone,” Villa snapped. “It’s not yours.”

“What? It’s the trash,” Cristiano said. He grinned. “You’re so protective of other people’s things, just like a dog. I thought Morientes was getting sent somewhere else.”

Villa huffed and reddened in the face, and for a moment Cristiano thought…but the fox demon spoiled the fun and just stalked down the alley. Oh, well. They were buying it, even they wouldn’t play with him. You couldn’t always have everything.

* * *

Zlatan lounged against the jamb. He rubbed his nose, looking over Ricardo’s head, his brows lowering and then rising in apparent thought. Then he moved his arm down so that it was his shoulder resting against the doorway. He raised his head and frowned at something far behind Ricardo, and then he nodded sharply. “It _wasn’t_ my fault. That idiot Sandro left the cap off again. He had it last, right before Paolo got out of the shower.”

Ricardo pursed his mouth in confusion and irritation. He took a deep breath to control the latter and then politely cleared his throat. “I’m sorry if I’m interrupting, but may I—”

“Oh.” The demon looked down at Ricardo. Then he rolled his eyes and half-turned, rumpling at his hair with one hand. “You’re still here. All right, I guess I’ll tell Paolo you’re here, but he’s in a shitty mood and if you make it worse, I’m kicking your ass out.”

It briefly occurred to Ricardo that he should have started with Gianluigi. He might find it more difficult to speak with Gianluigi than with Paolo, but it was considerably less…of a strain on his patience to deal with Alberto. “Thank you,” Ricardo finally said, carefully choosing his words and tone. “I appreciate your accommodation, and will try not to cause any distress.”

“Forget your appreciation,” Zlatan snorted. He took one slow step backwards, his eyes fixed on Ricardo, his shoulders flexing like a beast readying itself for a lunge. He jerked up his chin, and when Ricardo didn’t immediately move, rudely flipped his hand to wave Ricardo inside. “Just don’t start any shit. Now come on. Paolo doesn’t have all day to deal with you. We’re opening in an hour with a new menu and the last thing he needs is—”

“—some fire-breathing moron who burned the veal and then dumped the ashes in the _paper_ waste. It’s nice to see that you actually notice menu changes but if you’re going to pretend it’s your restaurant too, you could remember that we have _health inspectors_ com—oh.” Sandro rounded the corner and took two steps towards Zlatan, shaking a clipboard at the demon. Then he saw Ricardo and pulled himself up sharply. His eyes flicked up and down Ricardo, not quite hostile but not pleased either, and then went to Zlatan.

“He wants to see Paolo about something.” Zlatan wrinkled his nose and ambled past Ricardo and Sandro, only to lazily circle back behind Sandro. He bent down so that he could stage-whisper in Sandro’s ear; Ricardo also spotted Zlatan’s hand sneaking down Sandro’s arm to close on the clipboard. “Says Andriy had some angel visit him earlier and he’s worried about what it means. Friend of yours? Sounds nosy enough.”

Sandro hit Zlatan on the arm and then on the chest to force the demon away from him. He raised his hand, then stopped himself in the middle of a word to stare at his empty hand. Then he snarled and yanked his clipboard back from Zlatan. “ _You’d_ be the authority on that. Paolo’s in the front, Kaká. I’ll tell him you’re here.”

“Don’t you ever get tired of those cracks?” Zlatan asked. “Honestly, three years you’ve been happy to have my nose between your legs every ni—”

Ricardo flushed and averted his eyes. He heard Sandro snap a curt ‘never’ and then walk off, but he didn’t hear any other noise and so he was surprised, upon raising his head again, to find that Zlatan had also departed. For a few moments he stood in the hallway, uncertain as to whether he was meant to stay and wait there or to follow Sandro.

He had his mind made up when the door behind him opened and a man inquired as to where he wanted the product put. After hastily informing him that he wasn’t in charge, Ricardo offered to go find the man who was and then stepped into the kitchens.

While he’d visited the restaurant several times, primarily to see Alberto, he had only been in the reception area or the back hallway. He hadn’t stepped into the kitchen itself since he’d discovered an amnesiac Andriy had returned from Hell and had been hiding there, and at that time the restaurant had been shut up for the night and empty. Now it was filled with bustling cooks and waiters, with steam billowing out from the pots on the stovetops and a roaring, aromatic fire crackling under the grill grates, filling the air with the earthy, dense smells of roasted meat and pizza and herbs. It was an entirely different place, and not one in which Ricardo felt comfortable.

He edged to the side so as not to be in people’s way, then slipped through the room as quickly as he could. The hallway to the dining rooms was fairly full of people as well—a large party appeared to be just breaking up—but Ricardo managed to spot the back of Sandro’s head and headed towards it. He reached the man just as Sandro turned with a cup of coffee in either hand.

Sandro’s brows flew up, then back down as he stared at Ricardo with considerably more distaste than before. He glanced at the cups in his hands before heaving a sigh. “I was going to get Paolo for you.”

“I know. I—there’s a deliveryman in the back, who asked where he should put his…boxes,” Ricardo said. He knew he sounded stiff and could see from the man’s face that Sandro was taking it as arrogance when in truth it was lingering discomfort. “I apologize for…”

“Oh, just—Adriana.” Twisting his head over his left shoulder, Sandro addressed a tall, elegant woman tending to a display tray of desserts. “I think that late shipment’s here. Can you get them into the walk-ins? Paolo and I have a visitor.”

Adriana said she could and offered Ricardo a friendly, if curious smile as she strode into the kitchens. Then Sandro slid in front of Ricardo, his expression no more pleased than before. He pushed the cups into Ricardo’s hands while swerving his body about Ricardo to avoid a passing waiter laden with plates of food.

“Here, hold them and wait here,” Sandro said curtly, before stalking away. 

The angel cut directly through the dining room despite the efforts of several diners to hail him down. He appeared to be heading for the front reception; when Ricardo stretched his neck, he could glimpse Paolo’s head leaning into the doorway there. Ricardo pressed his lips together and looked down at the cups, then back out at the dining room. He knew Lilian had had a few meals here, and he had even been invited to one, but he’d declined that in favor of exorcising the rooms of a mage who had unexpectedly died. He’d never eaten here himself.

“Are those my espressos?” asked someone. When Ricardo turned around, a pleasant-looking, Spanish-accented waiter was standing there. The man said something about Sandro while taking the cups from Ricardo, then walked off with them while Ricardo was still trying to collect his thoughts.

Ricardo raised his hand, then lowered it. He’d waited too long and couldn’t call the man back without making a fuss, and it was probably simpler and less disruptive to confess his error to Sandro. If it was an error. At any rate, what was clearer was that Ricardo needed to pull himself together if he was going to extract anything useful from this visit. He would rather have stayed home and seen for himself that nothing untoward was going to come of Andriy’s dawn visitor, especially as Andriy himself continued to show absolutely no signs of concern about it. Sometimes Ricardo did wonder if that was purposeful—if the angel wished someone to come after him.

“Kaká?” said someone. Paolo, approaching with a mildly inquisitive expression and an extended hand. Sandro was behind him, still looking wary.

Paolo and Ricardo shook hands, and Paolo asked after Lilian before delicately suggesting that they retire to the office. Ricardo accepted, and was about to follow Paolo when he remembered the coffee. He turned back to tell Sandro about the waiter, but Sandro had disappeared.

A slight cough made Ricardo turn and find Paolo regarding him, still with a relatively benign air, but not with naiveté. The angel gestured for Ricardo to precede him, and after a moment, Ricardo did. He put the coffee out of his mind, and put back in his worries about the early morning visitor.

* * *

“We were just checking where he was,” Villa said, leading with a belligerent chin as he glowered up at Sandro. “Chill the fuck out, all right? It’s not like your wards blocked Xavi, so obviously you’re not that concerned about keeping us out.”

“That’s for _Gila’s_ sake, not yours. If I had my way, I’d fry you any time you and your constantly shedding fur and stealing got anywhere near my stocks. I _know_ who keeps swiping the sausages,” Sandro snapped back. He was completely not intimidated by Villa’s posturing and, judging from how he was flexing his fingers, was just about ready to grab Villa by the scruff and dropkick him down the alley.

Cristiano sighed into his espresso as Villa and Sandro bickered. At least the angels made damn good coffee, but that really wasn’t enough to make up for dragging him out here. They and Zlatan had stopped being interesting to him about the time that he’d realized that just by tonguing an angel, Zlatan was hitting more blasphemies than he normally did in a day, and he’d been hoping he could completely avoid them. But no, Ricky had to go wandering for the first time in a month right when Cristiano needed him. Sometimes Cristiano really didn’t know why the fuck he kept coming back to the man.

Well, no, he did. He sighed again, drank the espresso and then handed the empty cup back to Xavi, who seemed about to object. And then didn’t when Cristiano arched an eyebrow at him, so Cristiano got on to cracking a couple knuckles. Then he grabbed Villa by the shoulder, pulled him out of the way and stepped up to a suddenly stone-faced Sandro.

“Listen, I need to talk to Kaká. It’s important.” Cristiano assessed the level of pissed-off sanctimony in Sandro’s eyes. “It’s about demons trying to come after him.”

“Yes, I can see that,” Sandro said acidly. All that demon sex he was getting certainly hadn’t loosened his ass up any. Didn’t say much for Zlatan’s bedroom skills.

And here was Zlatan, sticking his head out over Sandro’s left shoulder. He looked just as disgusted to see them, as if fucking angels somehow made him better than all the other demons. “Why is he here?” Zlatan said, letting his fangs drop. He looked at Villa and Xavi. “Why are you hanging out with him? Oh, shit, you aren’t fucking him now, are you? Because Figo is going to fucking kill you for bringing that in, when you don’t know where he’s been—”

Villa looked absolutely horrified, and even the famously placid Xavi was a little green-faced. And Cristiano was, once again, unimpressed. “No, thanks, I don’t like having to worry about getting rug-rashes from my bedmates. Stop being a jerk and tell Kaká I’m out here and need to talk to him.” He raised his voice when it looked as if Zlatan was going to mouth off some more. “Then I don’t have to talk to him around you, and you don’t get another apocalypse at your restaurant. Okay?”

“What apocalypse? What did you do? Who did you bring up?” Sandro snapped in rapid succession. Of course now he was taking Cristiano seriously, since Zlatan wasn’t. “How long do we have?”

“I didn’t do it. I don’t know why everyone always thinks I’m behind them, all right? I mean, I like fucking. You can’t fuck anybody if they’ve all been wiped out in Armageddon or turned into heavenly souls with no parts to fuck,” Cristiano said, rolling his eyes. “It’s Andriy.”

Zlatan jerked his head back and half-turned, muttering to himself about fucking angels always ruining his day. Then he jutted his head over Sandro’s shoulder again. “ _Okay_ , then which bastard hell-king did _he_ raise?”

“I don’t know. I don’t talk to him. Because he stays inside with Kaká all the time. Which is why I need to see Kaká.” Cristiano used his hands to connect invisible dot A to invisible dot B to invisible dot C, just in case that might help nudge Zlatan along. He’d heard that the lava-spawned ones could be a bit slow, what with all that early heat cooking their brains. “But he’s inside your restaurant. I can’t go in there.”

“Maybe you could leave him another voicemail,” muttered Villa.

Sandro and Zlatan didn’t seem to get that, so maybe they hadn’t been totally filled in about the last demonlord that’d shown up in Milan. Not that that was helping to convince them to just get Kaká already. They stared at Cristiano, then pretended they weren’t glancing at each other when they were so wishing that the other one would make the call. Finally Sandro stepped back, rubbing at his temple as if he had a migraine and eyeing Cristiano as if he was trying to wish it on Cristiano.

“He’s in a meeting, but I’ll tell him you’re here,” Sandro said shortly. He obviously didn’t like being reduced to the messenger, but that was at least better than being the awkward, slouching, irritated baby-sitter left behind.

Zlatan snapped his teeth a couple times, which he did just to show off his fangs one last time before they vanished. And which was pointless, since Cristiano could make his just as long if he wanted to. Then Zlatan switched his slouch to the other side of the doorway, alternating his glare between Cristiano and the fox-demons. He finally settled on Cristiano. “I don’t believe you,” he said. “I think you’ve just got some weird idea that you’re going to get Kaká to lose his virginity.”

Cristiano shrugged and pulled out his mobile to check his texts. “If I do, then what do you care? You don’t like him.”

“Hey!” Villa protested. “You lying—”

“I’m not lying, you moron. I’m just teasing him while we’re waiting,” Cristiano said. The only reason he didn’t roll his eyes again was because he’d gotten a message from his tailor that his next fitting had gotten moved up, and he needed to confirm it or lose the slot. Otherwise seriously, he was starting to think he’d be better off ditching the foxes and trying to do this one on his own. He did need the manpower, but if it could be a little less _stupid_ …“If I was just trying to get Kaká to fuck someone, I wouldn’t be going through all this trouble. It’s not like I need any of you for that.”

“Point,” Zlatan said after a moment. He was staring at something back in the restaurant, which meant he missed Cristiano’s brief second of shock. By the time he turned back, he’d gone back to irritated too. “But that doesn’t mean you aren’t trying to start something, and I’m not in the fucking mood.”

Tailoring appointment confirmed, Cristiano put away his phone, rolled back his shoulders and looked Zlatan in the eye. “What makes you think I’m trying to start something?”

Zlatan blinked hard. For a moment he looked as if he was going to take that personally, like asking him to explain himself was the same as kicking him in the balls or something like that, and then he suddenly narrowed his eyes. He stared at Cristiano long enough for Cristiano to wonder if maybe he’d caught onto it, possibly picking up a trace smell despite Cristiano’s thorough showering earlier, and then he snorted.

“Are you fucking around with me?” he said incredulously. “The last time you wanted to see Kaká, those furballs—”

“We only curl up when we’re _sleeping_ ,” Villa muttered grumpily.

“—were running all over the place trying to help Thuram exorcise an archduke, Sandro was flipping out because Satanists were fritzing his detection spells and I was _this_ fucking close to saving that fucking idiot priest just to make sure that he and his Fallen One fixation didn’t accidentally blow up my city.” Zlatan leaned down so that he could bulge his eyes at Cristiano with more precision. It wasn’t clear if he thought that made him look more menacing or if he thought he’d get a better view of Cristiano that way. “And after that I’m supposed to believe you’re innocent?”

If it was to see Cristiano better, Cristiano could tell the overdramatic idiot that that definitely wasn’t the best angle, and he’d know better than Zlatan, what with the amount of time he spent and mirrors he used checking on that. “I’m not saying I’m innocent. I’m an incubus. And I like Kaká, but he’s a virgin repressing so many issues that he can’t tell the difference between feeling bloated and feeling righteous. But I’m not the one who lured Andriy back here, and I’m not the one who sent Kaká after him. And I’m definitely not the one who got those Satanists in town. Devil-worshipping is so _tacky_ these days.”

“Yeah, they’re not really into limited-edition jeans, are they?” Zlatan drawled.

“But I heard you were trying to find Andriy,” Xavi suddenly said. His eyes widened a fraction when Cristiano turned on him, but otherwise he didn’t react. Unlike Villa next to him, bristling so much that he’d popped a claw out through his left sneaker. “You were looking for him for Kaká.”

“Yeah, I was.” Cristiano shrugged. He could tell that Villa thought that sealed the deal, but honestly, who was the suspicious one? The one looking for someone or the one who’d asked him to look? “But I wasn’t going to bring him back here. I was just going to tell Kaká where he was, once I’d found him. Because that’s what he asked me to do.”

Zlatan snorted. “And you’re such good friends with him that, out of the goodness of your heart, you were going to do what he asked and just that.”

“Look, you’re not exactly fucking those angels because it offends the ones who still have their wings, are you? Which it does, but you’re not doing it for them,” Cristiano said. He grinned when Zlatan’s pupils suddenly went to slits. “I’m not on the clock all the time. Sometimes I just like hanging out with humans. I’d think you would get that.”

“I get that. I just don’t think I get you. And even if I did, Kaká wouldn’t be your type,” Zlatan said after a long moment. His tone was curt and growling, but he was shifting back in the doorway. He glanced over his shoulder at something, then jerked his head back to glower at Villa, who was edging up on the left with a hungry, dreamy look on his face. “ _Hey_. You heard Sandro. You stay the fuck away from our kitchen, or else I’ll torch you and tell Gila that you slipped and fell on the stove burners.”

Villa geared up for a scathing reply, but before he could deliver it, Sandro reappeared with a confused Kaká trailing behind him. When Kaká saw Cristiano, he flushed and then paled, and then pressed his lips tightly together. He almost missed the fox-demons, acknowledging them just with a little stiff twitch of his brows. Much to Cristiano’s amusement, Villa seemed even more offended by that than he had by Zlatan’s threats.

“Hey,” Cristiano said cheerfully. “I need to talk to you. There’s some demon coming after Andriy’s ass and I thought you’d want to know. Want to go grab a coffee?”

* * *

Paolo had a strangely modern office, or perhaps that was because Ricardo had grown accustomed to rooms furnished the same as they had been hundreds of years ago when their buildings had first been erected. A pair of skylights let in plenty of sunlight, which was made brighter by the reflective surfaces of the mostly-steel, softly burnished furniture. The upholstery was off-white cloth save for the couch against the wall, which was black leather.

“You can have a seat, if you wish,” Paolo said. He was polite but a little hesitant—not out of weakness, but from curiosity.

He seemed to be waiting to see what Ricardo would do, and when Ricardo declined the chair, the angel remained standing. Paolo pursed his lips as if about to ask a question, but then looked down at his desk instead. He brushed at a few papers there—invoices. Then he looked up expectantly.

“An angel came this morning,” Ricardo blurted out. Then he grimaced and dropped his gaze. He saw that his hands were in his pockets and, thinking that that was a little too informal, pulled them out and his rosary as well. The beads nearly rattled on the floor before he snatched them back up. He took a deep breath and then started again. “I’m concerned that Andriy might be facing retribution for his decision. But I have no experience with such things—”

“And you thought that I would.” The tone was surprisingly cool, though when Ricardo looked at him, Paolo didn’t seem hostile so much as…considering. And possibly not even considering Ricardo, given the slight distance to the angel’s gaze. “I understand that, but I don’t think that I can be much help to you. Neither Sandro nor I have received threats from other angels—in fact, we’ve hardly encountered them since our…choices. I actually think that they’ve been avoiding us.”

Near the end Paolo’s voice rose sharply and then bit off. The angel stared past Ricardo, his lips thinned. Then he shook his head and looked back at Ricardo, his pleasant air restored.

“I’m sorry if I’m asking about something that offends you,” Ricardo said after a moment. He coiled up his rosary and began to slide it back into his pocket. “It wasn’t my intention. I’m only…I would like to stop any attacks, if they’re coming.”

“No, I understand. But I’m sorry.” Paolo spread his hands to show his empty palms. “I’m out of touch with the Host now. And I don’t…I do not remember a situation like this coming up when…when I was with them. So I cannot tell you what they might be intending to do.”

“Oh.” Ricardo bit the inside of his cheek, then glanced away. He was disappointed, of course, but the grinding frustration that was rising in him surprised him with how fierce it was. While it would’ve been helpful to have gotten advice from Paolo, the angel was hardly the only possible source available to Ricardo. And it wouldn’t be the first time that Ricardo would have to operate with little to no information about what he was facing. So why he was so… _angry_ …

He looked up, blinking. Then he started to apologize for missing the question, but Paolo merely waved it away with one hand. “I only wanted to know how Andriy was,” Paolo said, quietly and a little tentative. He paused, then picked at his invoices again. “I don’t think I bear him any ill will for when he was an enemy. And I wouldn’t like to see him suffer now for the choice he’s made, when it was harder than the one I made. I was wondering, actually, if I could see him.”

Paolo looked at Ricardo for a few seconds before Ricardo realized he was expected to reply. “I don’t know,” he said. Then he bit his cheek again. “That is, he says he’s content. I don’t know if you can see him. He hasn’t asked for you.”

“Would you ask him if we could speak?” Paolo pressed.

Ricardo felt a sharp flare of irritation, which again he didn’t understand. He knew his failure to answer immediately must look odd to Paolo, and—the door opened, thankfully saving him from having to sort through his feelings right then.

Paolo blinked hard, then came out from behind his desk. “Sandro?”

“Cristiano’s outside,” Sandro said tersely. Then he came through the doorway and looked at Ricardo as if he wished he could exorcise Ricardo. “He’s asking for you, and says it involves Andriy.”

“Oh.” Ricardo immediately started forward, then remembered his manners and hurriedly thanked Paolo. Then he headed out with Sandro to the alley behind the restaurant, where to his surprise, two of the fox-demons were also waiting.

And Cristiano. They hadn’t met since before Andriy’s return, though Lilian had informed Ricardo of Cristiano’s role in helping to carry Ricardo and Andriy away from the park and of Cristiano’s explanation for how his phone had been used to trick Ricardo. Lilian apparently believed the demon—although Ricardo hadn’t pushed the man on that point. In all honesty, Ricardo had been so anxious about Andriy’s reappearance that he’d been more concerned with keeping Lilian from seeing it as something to investigate than with finding out what had really happened.

But seeing Cristiano’s welcoming smile reminded Ricardo that that was still very much an open question, and one that bore directly on Andriy’s safety. Ricardo pulled himself up at the doorway, only half-listening to Cristiano’s greeting.

Cristiano noticed. His brows flew up. Then he grinned again, with more of a sarcastic edge to it. “I texted you a few times, but you never replied,” he said. “I figured you might be busy trying to snap Andriy out of his coma.”

“He’s not in a coma,” Ricardo said sharply. He was aware of Sandro waiting impatiently behind him and reluctantly stepped out into the alley. He looked at the fox-demons again, but they didn’t seem to have any contributions. “We should talk. I have some questions for you.”

“Like did I try to get you sacrificed by a bunch of idiots running around in stupid robes and really bad goth makeup?” With a casual swing of the hip, Cristiano turned himself around and slotted in by Ricardo’s left side. He swayed close enough for his sleeve to brush Ricardo’s arm, then moved back with exaggerated care. “I thought you knew me better than that.”

Ricardo couldn’t help smiling at that. “I wouldn’t presume to think that I know you at all.”

“Aw, Ricky, and I thought we were starting to be friends,” Cristiano said, pouting like a child. But he swung his arm over Ricardo’s stiff shoulders with a hard glint in his eye; he knew full well what Ricardo’s reception to that would be, and enjoyed the reaction. “C’mon, foxes. I think if we put you on leashes, we might get away with sneaking you in to the place I’m thinking of. They let dogs in.”

“That’s not necessary,” Ricardo said. He forced himself to ignore the weight of Cristiano’s arm and turned to look at the fox-demons. He started to address them, but had to stop when he saw that they were still preoccupied with staring disgustedly at Cristiano.

After a moment, one of them turned towards him and Ricardo took the chance to ask why they were there. “Gila,” said the one looking at him. “But we’re going now.”

The other one twisted around sharply, then shut up his mouth with obvious reluctance. They must have signaled to each other, because they both abruptly dropped into shadowy patches on the ground that quickly raced away.

Ricardo briefly considered calling them back, but decided that the threat to Andriy was of more importance. It would be a simple enough matter to telephone Alberto later and find out the truth, whereas with Cristiano…who was frowning in the direction that the foxes had gone; Ricardo had caught him in one of those rare moments where the cheesy, ditzy façade dropped to reveal something much harder and more menacing.

Then Cristiano realized Ricardo was looking at him. The demon started in on a joke, but Ricardo cut him off. “Let’s go and then you can tell me,” Ricardo said. “I’m in a hurry.”

Surprisingly enough, Cristiano agreed. They continued, briskly and in silence, to a nearby café. The place presented a second shock, since it was a quiet, nondescript shop in an isolated location, the exact opposite of the trendy, highly visible areas Cristiano usually seemed to prefer.

“I was trying to help you,” Cristiano said after they sat down. For once he didn’t try to be charming, but spoke simply and directly. “I was looking for Andriy. There were a lot—there still are a lot of people—who didn’t want you two to reunite, you know.”

“I didn’t.” Ricardo paused to allow their coffees to be set down before them and their server to withdraw. Then he looked closely at Cristiano. “Why would anyone be concerned with that?”

Cristiano snorted, then put both hands around his mug and pulled it towards him. He pushed himself up in his chair and snorted again at his coffee. He appeared to be trying to stifle a laugh, and eventually seemed to regain enough control of himself to answer Ricardo, albeit in a slow, scattered manner. “Well, the problem is that you’re…special. You’d make a good vessel for…you know, being possessed, bringing over demonlords…”

“I’ve been told that before,” Ricardo said dryly. “But what does this have to do with—”

“Part of it’s because you’re a virgin,” Cristiano said. He had to pause and carefully drink some coffee. Then he set his cup down and regarded it with a strangely reflective expression. “I don’t just mean with fucking. You’re not…committed to anything right now. Back when you were all fanatical, I hear only the ones who liked a challenge bothered with you, since everybody else figured you’d make good on your pledge to become a priest. Doesn’t mean that demons can’t still get into priests, but it’s harder.”

Ricardo stared into his own coffee. “I’m still committed to my faith,” he finally said. “But I no longer believe that certain doctrines necessarily have to be followed in order to respect that commitment.”

“Good for you, but your problem is that you don’t really know what is this ‘faith’ of yours now.” Cristiano glanced up, then laughed in almost childish delight. “Don’t worry, it’s not like I’m suddenly a mind-reader. It’s because I’m a demon. We can smell when people don’t know what to do, and that’s when we get them.”

“Thank you for warning me,” Ricardo muttered. He pressed his lips together while turning his cup around and around in his hands. “But are you saying that I was better off when I was blindly following Church rules?”

“I don’t know. I’m not you. I’m just saying that people who know what to do are harder to shake, and if a demon can’t shake them, they can’t get at them,” Cristiano replied. The blunt, unapologetic way he spoke did more to convince Ricardo that the demon was being honest than any amount of flattery or wit would have. “But fucking somebody would help too. Don’t make a face at me. I _do_ know about fucking, and for you humans it’s one of the best ways to convince yourself that you know what to do. It’s hard to fuck someone when you don’t believe in it, at least right then.”

After a moment, Ricardo leaned back in his seat. He rubbed at his jaw, then let out an incredulous, short laugh when Cristiano continued to look at him with that intently serious expression. “I think you’re talking about love.”

“I think I’m talking about fucking.” Cristiano shrugged as he lifted his coffee. “Sometimes I guess it could be what you humans call love, but I don’t stay to see what it ends up being. I’m just there for the—”

“Fucking, yes, you’ve said that clearly and often enough.” The expletive came awkwardly off Ricardo’s tongue and he had to concede the amused flash in Cristiano’s eyes. But then he pushed himself up straight in his chair and fixed his eyes on the demon. “Fine. I’m a target. How does this affect Andriy?”

“It’s his problem too because now everybody thinks he’s the one who’s going to screw you and make you stop being such a great way to start Judgment Day,” Cristiano explained between sips at his coffee. He cocked an eyebrow at Ricardo, then put down his cup and heaved a sigh. “Love, fuck, whatever, okay? The point is, he’s still powerful enough to fight off somebody else who wants you, and demons are going to expect him to do that if he bothers to—”

“I’m also quite capable of taking care of myself,” Ricardo said stiffly. He was offended and at the same time he felt oddly…helpless. First of all he was still relatively new to the experience of being talked about by others: he’d always known of the disapproval many held for Lilian’s unorthodox methods and knew that sometimes extended to him by association, no matter if he also disagreed with Lilian. But he and Lilian had normally spent most of their time traveling in relative backwaters, far from the seats of power, and so it was easy to ignore the rumors.

Secondly, when he had been exposed to gossip in the past, he had always been in a position to respond personally to it. He had never felt as if it was beyond him to shape others’ expectations of him, at least till now. It was hard to see how he could correct what Cristiano was telling him, short of declaring war on all demons. And while he once had happily chosen that path, he was reluctant for several reasons now to return to…he would fight, of course, to protect and to help other people. But he was beginning to understand better Lilian’s distinction between that and aggression.

And then there was his increasingly complex and confusing view of demons, which brought him back to Cristiano. The demon had an amused smile playing about his lips, but he was quietly waiting for Ricardo to recollect himself. Once he knew he had Ricardo’s attention, he put his arms on the table and leaned forward. “Yeah, I know, but Ricky? A lot of demons don’t give a shit. For them people are fodder, and Andriy’s the one they would see as a threat.”

“So he’s the one they would come after, on my behalf. That’s what you’re saying.” Ricardo looked into his coffee. Then quickly back up at Cristiano, who blinked in surprise, halfway into relaxing his stance. “But your phone that was hacked. What happened?”

“ _Oh_. Right. Well, I was looking, and I found him and I did call you to say so. But then I got into a fight, I think because I was already being followed, and they stole my phone and changed my voicemail message,” Cristiano said. He made a face and flicked at a few places on his arms, and one on his neck where Ricardo could see a faint scar. “It took a while to get out of the fight, and when I did, Andriy had gone off. I wasted a lot of time trying to figure out where, and then I realized what was going on and came back to warn you, but I got into another fight. Fucking Satanists.”

“Are you saying they went after you?” Ricardo asked in mild surprise. “But you’re a demon.”

Cristiano rolled his eyes. “Yeah, but would you believe that Satanists can be snobs? These assholes didn’t believe I was a real demon because I had on white sneakers and that’s heaven’s color. Seriously, like we’re going to be _that_ obvious about color-coding ourselves when we’ve gotta blend in with people.”

He looked startled when Ricardo laughed, and that was enough to convince Ricardo that Cristiano was telling the truth. Of course Ricardo didn’t pretend to assume that he knew all of Cristiano’s motivations, but he did believe in the demon’s pride.

“Thank you for coming to warn me,” Ricardo finally said. “But I should go now. Andriy should know too.”

Cristiano made a few attempts to keep him longer, talking up the café’s pastries and offering to help Ricardo find out exactly which demons might come after him, but Ricardo turned him down. With threats from both above and below, Ricardo didn’t feel comfortable leaving Andriy alone for very long. And he should at least try to explain the dangers to Andriy, even if he didn’t believe that the angel would care. He needed to go.

* * *

“I don’t buy it,” Xavi suddenly said. “He told us that it’s Rabisu, but he just told Kaká it was ‘some demon’ when he should’ve said who it was if he really wanted to get Kaká’s attention.”

David kept banging around the kitchen, apparently trying to find the spare glasses. He was looking on the wrong side of the room and Raúl would’ve told him so if Cesc hadn’t popped his head in just then. “Hey, just finished the rounds and nobody’s seeing anything unusual. So if something’s coming, it’s being really, really sneaky. Or Cristiano’s lying,” Cesc reported.

“He’s fucking lying.” David finally gave up on those cabinets and turned around, only to make an annoyed face when Raúl handed him a pair of empty glasses. Then he sighed, muttered a thanks and began to fill them with _horchata_. “We all know that. I don’t know why we’re still sitting here debating it.”

“We’re not debating that he’s up to something besides what he’s telling us,” Raúl said patiently. “But based on past experience, it’s not that straightforward. He mixes lies and truth, and we need to be careful about which is which before we do anything. Especially since this might not even be our fight. I don’t want to get involved on Kaká’s behalf if he can handle it himself.”

After a moment’s thought, David sighed again and handed Raúl one of the glasses. He moodily began to drink the other one, then lowered it to look suspiciously at Raúl. “What? What’s wrong with it?”

“Nothing,” Raúl said, blinking. “Have you seen Silva yet?”

David made a face, then rolled his eyes. “He’s still over at Gila’s, trying to explain things so Gila will stay out of it. Look, I was a bastard before and you didn’t deserve that, even if we disagreed. I’m trying to be better about it and it’s not because anyone told—”

“Well, thank you.” Raúl paused for a moment so the other demon would know he really meant it. Then he took a sip from his glass. “We can’t really approach Kaká, and while we should keep someone on Cristiano, I don’t think that that’ll tell us everything. So I think the question now is how to approach Thuram.”

Cesc stopped grinning at David’s back long enough to ponder that point. He tugged his ears, seemed unsatisfied with the result and tugged David’s left ear as he came into the kitchen. He ignored David’s surprised yelp and slung his arm over Xavi’s shoulders. “Why can’t we just tell Thuram that Cristiano’s sniffing around Kaká? Isn’t that enough to get him worried?”

“No, because Cristiano helped carry Kaká home last time and now Thuram thinks Cristiano’s all nice and bullshit like that,” David muttered, covering his ear with his hand. He glowered at Cesc and shuffled slightly more towards Raúl. “We overheard the priest and Figo talking about it, and Thuram also thinks that Kaká needs to be left alone to deal with Andriy, because the weirdo already puts too much pressure on himself and forcing him to do something’s going to make him even less likely to treat Andriy like…okay, and I don’t know why Thuram wants Andriy to be treated nice. And I don’t _want_ to know.”

Raúl, Xavi and Cesc all looked at David with the same confused expression. At first David hunched back his shoulders while jutting up his chin, but gradually he seemed to understand that they weren’t accusing him of being an idiot. They just really didn’t know what he meant. He flushed, scratched at his head and then looked despairingly up at the ceiling, muttering something about it sounding better from Silva.

“Thuram’s trying to hook up Kaká, all right?” David eventually explained, as if it was being dragged out of him by Zlatan’s claws. “He’s convinced that that’s the root of Kaká’s whole issue with Andriy, and now that Kaká’s dropped out of the priesthood, he thinks Kaká needs to face up to that. And I stopped listening there, so I don’t know anything else about it.”

“Oh. Well, so what? That’s his thing and we don’t need to worry about it.” Cesc turned back to Xavi and Raúl. “Maybe we can just say that we heard Rabisu might be showing up, and we want help checking it out? It’s true, and he’s not going to guilt us into admitting that it’s a lie ‘cause it’s not, and it’d tell us whether Cristiano’s making that up.”

Xavi nodded slowly, then frowned and raised his hand. “But we can’t just say we heard it. He’s going to want to know where we heard it. So Cristiano’s going to come into it somewhere.”

“So we tell him we heard it from Cristiano, but we just leave out the bit where it involves Kaká. We can totally downplay it, act like Cristiano was probably lying but we’re not sure, and we’re friendly neighborhood demons now so it’s okay to help us make sure things aren’t going to get fucked up and all that,” Cesc replied.

“It matters because I don’t want to end up matchmaking,” David blurted out. “I might not work for Hell now, but I’m still a demon, damn it.”

They looked at him again. “You sound like Zlatan bickering with his angels,” Cesc eventually said. Then he turned briskly back to Raúl, shrugging off David’s outraged noises. “Actually, you know what? We can just start off saying to Thuram that we heard rumors about some weird things still going on at the park, and we’re nervous about whether people are still trying to mess around there. He did the exorcism so he’ll want to know he did it right.”

“I think then he’s going to ask why we need his help figuring that out. We’d be in a better position to know what’s going on than he would be, and he might not be as quick to judge demons as some, but he doesn’t have any illusions as to what we are.” Sometimes having humans on their side could be so much more complicated than with the old black-and-white system, Raúl thought. “Also, he doesn’t know yet that Pep and Fernando are up here. I don’t want to put him in a position where he might find that out.”

“Why not?” Cesc asked, blinking. “I kinda thought they’d all get along. I mean, Thuram borrows the same books from Luís that Pep wants.”

Xavi had been so quiet that Raúl had temporarily forgotten he was there, but now he cleared his throat. He waited for David and Cesc to stop twitching in surprise, then pointed at Raúl. “I have to agree with that. Thuram’s nice to us, yeah, but he doesn’t like much demon _lords_ , and he’d know about Hierro and Pep and what they’ve done.”

“Oh. Right. That. But that was like, hundreds of years ago, and they’ve been in Hell since then. Don’t you think it would even out for Thuram by now?” Cesc said.

“Even if it had, he still might have issues with the way we brought them back up. At the end of the day, he’s for protecting people, and every time you reverse the flow from here to Hell, that has repercussions,” Raúl interrupted, cutting off Xavi’s answer. He put back his shoulders and reminded himself that he was still the effective leader, and had to make the hard calls for a while longer. “David, you’re in charge of keeping tabs of Cristiano for now. I’ll ask Figo to talk to Thuram. I think if it comes from him, it won’t look as odd as if we went to see him again. Thuram will be concerned but he won’t right away think that there’s something seriously wrong.”

David made a face and muttered about preferring to run around the sewers looking for clues, but he eventually agreed to coordinate Cristiano’s trackers. Predictably, Cesc was instantly abuzz with ideas for talking Figo into talking to Thuram—unnecessary, since Figo owed Raúl a favor for some black market _brujah_ contacts—and Raúl eased Cesc off into the next room to go brainstorm that with some of the others. Then he turned around, about to take off himself, and found himself looking at Xavi’s calm, mildly inquisitive gaze.

“What do you think Cristiano is up to?” Xavi asked. “He came to us for a reason.”

“I know.” Raúl checked around them and amazingly enough, no one else appeared to be in earshot. He glanced around one more time, then sighed and rubbed at his nose. “And I don’t know. With how eager he was to get us after Kaká…except that can’t be it. Kaká has barely been out since Andriy returned.”

“It’s like Cristiano’s hoping we’ll get distracted by him while he does something else.” Xavi paused, then nodded. “But yeah, I know. That’s also too obvious. He’s not exactly known to be a master strategist, but he’s not dumb either.”

And half the problem was that that was about all they knew of Cristiano, mainly from their own choice: demons didn’t necessarily get involved with each other’s activities and most of them found Cristiano too off-putting to pay much attention to him. Up till recently they’d viewed him as a flashy, annoying but ultimately harmless solo operator, not one to fear but not one to cultivate either. His odd relationship with Kaká had revealed another side to him, and then his mysterious role in Andriy’s reappearance was apparently revealing yet another side.

“We just can’t rule anything out at this point,” Raúl finally said. “We’ll have to watch everything. Cristiano, Kaká, and any breaches between Hell and here that might be appearing. Sooner or later someone has to make a move, but till then, we can’t say who to go after.”

Xavi nodded again, then turned to go. Then he paused and turned back. He looked hesitant—rare for him. “Raúl? Should we run this by them?”

“I don’t think—” Raúl stopped and looked down at the floor, rubbing at his left eye. Then he looked up at Xavi, who was still watching him calmly but expectantly, with a firmness to his gaze that wasn’t going to be put off with an excuse. Old instinct urged Raúl to try that anyway, but his commonsense eventually overruled that; Xavi was advanced enough in the ranks these days to have a right to know, and Raúl knew very well that he couldn’t afford to let his pride rise over the greater good. “I don’t know, honestly. It’d take a while to get them up to speed—just explaining Kaká would be complicated. And…and I don’t know if they would want to. You talk to Pep more these days…”

“I know, but…” Xavi grimaced “…well, it’s a big deal for him just to talk to Figo, you know? I think they’re still getting used to the idea that it’s not a war with just two sides. But I don’t like not telling them. I get that we can’t just go after the enemy anymore, though, and that’s what they’re used to doing.”

He sounded so frustrated that Raúl couldn’t help but offer up a sympathetic smile. Xavi had come a long way since the impulsive, barely-grown kit who’d scrambled onto the earthly plane and nearly been eaten by Zlatan for it, but he was still young enough to feel indignation at the hard decisions. It’d been a good long while since Raúl had even had the time for that.

“Maybe not now,” Xavi finally said, his voice lifting inquiringly at the end. “I guess you’re right. We probably need to figure out what’s going on before we even try doing anything else.”

“Hey, guys?” Mata looked in on them. “Kaká’s back at his place, and Cristiano’s on the move again, separately. Guaje wants to know what you want to do about Kaká now.”

“I can do that if you want,” Xavi offered. “You’re going to be busy with Thuram.”

Raúl agreed and thanked him, and then went to call Luís to try and explain what they wanted. There was another one who would want to know what was going on, but Luís would probably be the simplest of all to deal with, ironically enough. It was odd that a human would be best at dealing with all the uncertainties of their lives, but that was pondering Raúl would have to leave for another time. He had work to do.

* * *

When Ricardo returned to his apartment, he found it dark and silent and a sudden, vicious fear snapped around his throat like a noose. But then a shadow at the far end of the living room moved, and he breathed freely. He heard a clink, started, and glanced down to realize it was only his keys jingling in his hand. He gave himself a sharp shake and then closed the door behind him.

Andriy drifted across the room, looking strangely at Ricardo. It was a moment before Ricardo identified the strangeness as an unfamiliar animation to the angel’s face: Andriy appeared to be genuinely curious. “Did you speak to Paolo?”

“He said he hadn’t had anyone come see him,” Ricardo said, still startled by the angel’s sudden interest. Then he bit his lip, chagrined at how accusing that that sounded. “I didn’t tell him that you’d said—”

“I know Gianluigi went to see him,” Andriy said. It wasn’t an interruption. He spoke too thoughtfully and calmly for that—it was more as if he’d not even thought that Ricardo would have more to say. “But Gianluigi chose later as well, so Paolo might not think that that counts. And I thought Fabio met him afterwards, but that was when Gianluigi…I still wouldn’t have thought he would say that.”

Ricardo put his hands in his pockets, then took them out. Then he put his right hand back in his pocket upon seeing that he still had his keys. He plucked restlessly at the pocket’s inner lining. “Paolo asked if he could see you. He said he thought other angels were avoiding him and Sandro.”

“I haven’t been avoiding him,” Andriy replied in a tone of mild surprise. His brows rose and then he smiled wryly, his gaze shifting slightly away from Ricardo. “It didn’t occur to me. I can visit him now, can’t I?”

“Only if you want to. You don’t have to.”

Andriy looked up. The humor faded from his face, and in the shadows he looked like an ancient statue, its polish made gritty by the abuses of the years. “Is he upset with me?”

“I—I don’t know,” Ricardo stammered. He couldn’t understand from where Andriy would draw that conclusion and tangled himself up in trying to determine how to the point that he almost missed Andriy’s next question. “I’m sorry, I didn’t—”

“I did drop in on him without much of an explanation, and I never apologized for it. It must have been very disruptive for him,” Andriy said. He smiled again, then abruptly looked away. He ran one hand through his hair.

“You mean when you came back from Hell. And appeared at his restaurant.” Ricardo tried to compose himself, but only felt an increasing sense of frustration at his inability to conduct even the simplest interaction with Andriy. Every time it always ended like this, with Andriy even more of a mystery than before and Ricardo nearly—it was against all his principles but sometimes Ricardo wanted to _hit_ the angel. Because somehow, it felt as if that would make Andriy see how difficult it was for Ricardo and make him…be easier.

Something of that must have showed on Ricardo’s face, because Andriy looked back at him and then straightened up. The edge of a shadow cut through Andriy’s eyes, turning them dark and wild, and for a moment Ricardo saw the fearful killer in him.

Then Andriy stepped back a pace. He had one hand in his pocket, like Ricardo, and kept it there as he looked absently at a book on a nearby table: a demonology text Lilian had lent Ricardo a week ago and that Ricardo still hadn’t opened. “Do you not want me to talk to Paolo?”

“I didn’t even think you cared that I was going to see him,” Ricardo finally said, voice tight. “You seemed uninterested earlier.”

“I thought you wanted to see him because you thought it would help me, and he’s not going to help me. I don’t want him to help me either.” Andriy’s brow furrowed. He stooped a little to look closer at the book, then put out his free hand and flipped open the cover. “So I don’t see the point in it.”

Ricardo breathed in and out slowly. His head ached, as if the skin of it was drawn too tightly over his skull. “I don’t want you to be hurt again. That’s the point.”

“You can’t stop me from being hurt,” Andriy said sharply. He flicked the book shut, then put his fingers on the cover. Then he pushed on his hand so that his fingers curled under it. “I’m not here to be saved.”

“Then why are you here?” Ricardo snapped. He had taken a step forward before he knew what he was doing, and then he had to push both hands into his hips to keep himself from moving further. “Why are you staying with me? What’s the point if you don’t _care_ about any—”

Andriy’s palms were smooth and soft, without a hint of callus on them. It was strange, when he looked so like a man who’d been beaten down—but he didn’t look like one now. He was staring into Ricardo’s face, so close that Ricardo’s vision should have blurred him, but instead every speck of his eyes was crystalline in its distinctness, and his soft hands were holding Ricardo’s head between them as if he meant to crush it. His grip wasn’t painful, but Ricardo could feel the strength in it and could feel how much pain it could cause, if it wished.

A fingertip was lying across Ricardo’s left earlobe, the very end of it tipped slightly into his ear. The hollows of Andriy’s palms were warmer than the rest of his hands, and slid against Ricardo’s jawline as Ricardo finally hissed a breath. Andriy let his head move, and then pulled Ricardo forward by it, so that Ricardo knew that Andriy hadn’t yet breathed, and then knew when the angel did. A glazing puff as Andriy’s eyes half-closed and that ancient killer again looked out past the weary man.

“You asked me to stay,” Andriy said quietly. He tipped his head to the left and almost seemed about to touch Ricardo with part of his face. His nose and then his mouth. He didn’t. “You need me here. I know that. I don’t know why.”

“I—don’t—I asked, but I don’t—” Ricardo dragged his hands up to his waist, then tried to move them further and found that he couldn’t, clammy and frozen as they were “—why would you think I _need_ you? I never said that. I—what—I do want you to be—”

Andriy pulled at Ricardo’s head again, so that Ricardo felt his body turn to cold iron, and then abruptly pushed it back. His hands dropped to Ricardo’s shoulders and then slid lightly, almost casually up Ricardo’s throat, and where they touched Ricardo’s flesh clenched.

“Once I would have made you know how I know,” Andriy remarked, as soft and distant as when he discussed Heaven. He snorted to himself and raised his eyes to something beyond Ricardo. Then he pulled his hands away. “But this is different. I am—trying to be different.”

A reply rose in Ricardo’s throat like a storm and then bashed against the teeth he closed on it so hard that his head jerked forward. He saw Andriy move away and grabbed wildly at the angel, and then he had a handful of Andriy’s shirt and he was pushing his face up against Andriy’s, so that only Andriy’s rock backwards saved them from bumping into each other, and he didn’t know why.

For a moment Andriy’s eye was rounded with surprise. Then Andriy half-closed it and sighed, and as Ricardo opened his mouth, Andriy ran his hand down the side of Ricardo’s left cheek. Ricardo’s breath cracked back into his mouth instead of exiting in the form of words.

Andriy turned his hand over and the backs of his fingers moved up Ricardo’s cheek, then along the cheekbone so that a fingertip circled Ricardo’s temple. Then Andriy took it away, and stepped back, and his clothes fell free of Ricardo’s nerveless fingers.

“I’ve learned my lessons,” Andriy said. He absently dusted at his wrinkled clothing, then sifted his hair back into place with one hand as he half-turned away. “There are things that are inevitable, and resisting them only does more damage. But it’s not a lack of caring. It’s only that I know now I can’t force something I can’t control.”

Ricardo exhaled deeply. His heart was pounding in his ears, and he could feel sweat beading on his brow and at his hairline. When he rubbed his hands against his legs, they left damp tracks. “I don’t know what we’re talking about.”

“I think that that’s the problem.” Andriy began to walk towards the far window. “I’d like to talk to Paolo sometime.”

“And as I said, you can do as you like. I won’t object to something I don’t understand,” Ricardo said under his breath. He pushed his hand over his face, then hooked it over the back of his neck. Then he took it away and rubbed his palms over his thighs again. “But you should know that—that I heard there are other demons after you and me. You should be careful of that, even if you don’t think you can do anything about it. I’m going to be looking out for it, at any rate.”

After a moment, Andriy looked back over his shoulder. He had reached the window and was resting both hands on the sill, though he lifted one to the latch as he turned. “From Cristiano?”

“What?” Then Ricardo shook his head. “I didn’t…I didn’t say anything.”

Andriy suddenly looked weary again. He dropped his gaze to the sill, then turned to the window without lifting his head, so that his brow pressed against the glass. “No, but I can smell him on you, Kaká. And I have met him before.”

“Because I asked him to look for you for me. He’s helped me. He’s a demon, and he’s always been one and never been to Heaven, but he’s helped me,” Ricardo said.

“And do you understand that?” Andriy asked, tone unexpectedly biting. When Ricardo didn’t reply, Andriy abruptly twisted from the window and left the room.

Ricardo stared at the space where the angel had been. Then he exhaled. The sound of it rang hollowly through the room and made him even more edgy. He wavered for another moment, then shook himself violently and went into the kitchen.

Andriy was at the counter, with an apple and a knife. He began to cut out the core as Ricardo drew up in the doorway. “I will have to leave,” he said, before Ricardo could speak. “I can’t stay here forever. This isn’t where I should be. That’s what they said this morning, but I already knew that.”

“You can’t,” Ricardo blurted out.

The white core dropped out of the crimson peel, and the knife plunged back into the apple. “I will leave,” Andriy said.

* * *

Cristiano knew they were following him, but that didn’t mean that he changed his usual routine. On the contrary, he made sure to stop by each and every one of the projects on his list, and even added a couple one-offs that happened to be along his way. And of course he had to drop by his place to change his outfit, since he’d lost his coat. What with all of that, it was nearly evening when he finally had time to check up on Kaká again.

Kaká had stopped _specifically_ warding against Cristiano, but he still had more anti-demon and other protective spells up than anybody with a full set of bodily needs had a right to have up. And anyway, Andriy was being weird and reclusive, not comatose; as far as Cristiano knew, coming back from Hell and opting out of the whole war hadn’t made the angel any less able to detect demons. It wasn’t really a good time yet for that particular meeting, and Cristiano was an _exquisite_ master of good timing.

So Cristiano wasn’t stupid enough to go lurk across the street from Kaká’s house, like those foxes were probably doing when they weren’t giving his shadow pointy ears and devil horns. He went to Kaká’s church instead.

Like clockwork, Kaká showed up right after the last mass had finished and the place was emptying out. He came in through a side door, pulled up when he saw there were still people around, and then looked horribly guilty when one of the priests in training spotted him and went over to greet him. The man really needed to brush up on his social skills, stiff and awkward as he was when he didn’t want to talk about something. Cristiano didn’t even need demon senses to figure out that Kaká was deeply troubled and all that.

Around ninety percent of the audience was gone when Cristiano finally strolled over to Kaká. It felt a little weird to be inside a church—Cristiano’s skin wasn’t boiling or anything like that, but he felt like someone was constantly glaring at the back of his head—and Cristiano had to admit he was off his game for a second. He let Kaká send the pre-priest away and then come up to block them into a corner between a railing and a large stone statue of some saint who’d once visited.

“What are you doing here?” Kaká asked through clenched teeth.

Cristiano shrugged and adjusted the custom rhinestone-studded headset slung around his neck. Then he connected his iPod to it and began to scroll through his playlists. “Thought I’d let you know the latest developments. It’s not like I really wanna track you all over town to the places that are most likely to ruin my hair, you know. It’s just that you keep _ending up_ at them.”

For a moment Kaká stared at Cristiano, one hand sneaking up to rumple and tug at his hair. The bags under Kaká’s eyes had deepened and there was a nasty, hard edge just skidding around behind that tensely polite mask of the man’s, which was looking more frayed than Cristiano had ever seen it. But then Kaká sighed and pulled his hand down to press over his mouth. He muttered into his palm, then dropped the hand and looked wearily at Cristiano. “Very well. What’s happened?”

“You all right?” Cristiano asked. When Kaká looked blankly at him, Cristiano reached out and flicked his fingers near the bags under Kaká’s left eye, and Kaká barely even blinked. “You look like shit.”

Someone hissed sharply at them—one of those damn acolytes—and that finally made Kaká stir. He looked up, then grimaced and pulled at Cristiano’s arm, dragging into one of the side aisles. “I would appreciate it if you didn’t cause any trouble here,” he said under his breath. He paused, glanced around, and then tugged them out a door and onto a small portico. “What is it that you want?”

“Well, like I said, I was coming to see how you were.” Cristiano took the headphones from around his neck, made them vanish with a flick of his wrist and then put away his iPod as well. He looked at Kaká, who had his lips pressed tightly together, and then rolled his eyes. “Yeah, and also to tell you what’s happened since this morning, but I’m not going to tell you if you’re going to be like this.”

“I’m fine,” Kaká said curtly. He glanced at the door, which he’d left half-open in his hurry to get them away. Then he pressed the heel of his hand into his temple again. “What’s happened?”

“You just don’t listen sometimes, seriously. I’m. Not. Telling. You. Because. You. Look. Like—”

Kaká jerked forward a little. Then he pulled himself back. His hands were curled tightly by his hips and he looked up, then down as he breathed in and out very slowly. His eyes closed, then opened tiredly and fixed themselves on Cristiano. “Is it imminent?”

“Maybe.” In his jeans-pocket, Cristiano’s phone tingled. He put his hand into the pocket while leaning towards Kaká; he got his hand around the phone and Kaká completely didn’t notice. “Did you talk to Andriy?”

If the frustrated attitude hadn’t already given Kaká away, the violent twitch he had at that name would have. Then Kaká jerked his head around and stared at the stone wall surrounding the portico. He worked his jaw a few times before muttering to himself and waving one hand dismissively at Cristiano. “Do I need to do an exorcism?”

“Prob—wait. We’re not playing Twenty Questions here, all right? It’s kind of important, but not if you’re feeling as shitty as you look,” Cristiano said. When Kaká started to object, Cristiano reached out and pushed the man in the shoulder. Then he shook his finger in Kaká’s startled, irritated face. “You’re just going to make it worse if you try to do something when you’re like this. Don’t worry about it. Forget I even came. I’ll just go figure something out.”

Kaká blinked a few times, looking like he had contacts and like they were blurring the world for him. “You will…take care of it yourself. I find that even less believable than you inquiring after my health.”

“I’m not ‘inquiring after your health,’” Cristiano said, making exasperated quote marks with his fingers. “I’m asking you if you’re too fucking blueballed to deal with emergencies again, and it’s a fucking valid question with your past history. If you’re going to blow up my favorite second date spot because you and Andriy can’t get it on, I want to know.”

“I am _not_ bl—” Those lips sealed together Cristiano was surprised they didn’t melt into one, and then Kaká spent a few seconds fighting off a raging blush. He finally gave up that lost cause and just concentrated on being self-righteous through it, like usual. “I am not a novice, Cristiano. I’ve worked under extremely stressful conditions before and I am trained to keep my—”

“You got Andriy sent to Hell because you couldn’t figure out you were attracted to him fast enough,” Cristiano said bluntly.

Kaká’s face whitened. He actually looked as if he was going to hit Cristiano, and he did lose control of his power for a second. The air around them abruptly filled with the acrid smell of ozone.

“I’m sorry.” Cristiano glanced himself over and sighed when he spotted the singe-marks on his brand-new, formerly creaseless and pure white sneakers. Yet another outfit down the drain. “Seriously. But it’s true. And I like you, but not to the point that I’m going to let you fuck up my life like that.”

“I.” Then Kaká was quiet for a while. He moved around a little, then hissed and nearly cursed himself as he bumped into the church wall. He rubbed at his eyes again.

The phone tingled again. Cristiano ran his fingers around the case till he triggered the silencing spell. He kept his eyes on the man in front of him.

“I’m not as blind as you think,” Kaká eventually said, quiet and low like the ache of an old bruise. “I know.”

“Just knowing what’s wrong with you doesn’t mean you’re dealing with it. They’re two separate things.” Cristiano shrugged off Kaká’s startled look. “This is kind of my specialty, you know.”

“I thought your specialty was sex?” Kaká asked, half-amused, half-brittle.

“And how does that mean I don’t know about how people act when they’re pretending they’re stronger and better than they really are?” Cristiano retorted.

After a tense moment, Kaká abruptly snorted and looked down. He rumpled his hair and his shoulders slumped a little. Barely enough to be visible, but more than enough to tell Cristiano he was home free.

“I did speak to Andriy. And it…” Kaká looked up. He chewed on his lip, then suddenly yanked his hand out of his hair and put it forward—Cristiano thought the man was trying to grab him till he saw that the hand was palm-up. And Kaká was leaning forward, staring pleadingly at him. “I don’t _understand_. He doesn’t seem to care at all, about anything, and then—he wants to leave. I think it’s because he thinks I see him as a burden, but—but he won’t let me treat him as anything else.”

“That’s fucked-up,” Cristiano said. Then he sighed at the look he got. “Come on. Somebody’s got to say it.”

Kaká’s back was already going up, all stiff and defensive. “He’s had a difficult time lately.”

“Yeah, that’s what they always say when somebody sees the bruises. Look, do you want to get offended at me or do you want to talk about it? And then once you’re not so…twitchy, and I don’t have priests shushing me, maybe you can help me with this thing that’s happening.” Cristiano grinned. “I’m not asking you out. Seriously, Ricky, I did promise you I wouldn’t do that.”

“And sometimes I almost find you believable,” Kaká said. Reluctantly, but his tone and his stance wasn’t nearly as hostile as before. “I suppose you have a café in mind.”

“Or we could do a bar—okay, café it is.” After patting Kaká’s shoulder, Cristiano waved for the other man to go ahead of him.

They had to go back through the church and that wouldn’t have been Cristiano’s first choice, but it got them out of there faster. His phone started outright buzzing as they walked down the street from the church, but by then he didn’t really care if Thuram showed up. Kaká was going to be long gone and talking to him instead of to the priest, after all.

* * *

Thuram showed up at the bookshop before Raúl was really prepared to meet with him. When he’d called Luís, Raúl had had the impression that Luís would get around to contacting the priest the next day, and then Thuram would call them and set up an appointment. And he’d thought that he’d given that impression too; Luís had certainly seemed annoyed enough at the interruption to not be eager to get onto it. But instead Thuram knocked at the door right as they were shutting up the shop for the night.

Thankfully, it was Raúl, Xavi and Silva in the front room, and the moment Xavi saw Thuram, he scooted into the back to make sure that Pep and Fernando were out of sight. Silva looked a bit puzzled at Xavi’s rush, but he was sensible enough to not ask about it and to just fall into line behind Raúl as they answered the door.

“Good evening,” Thuram said. He smiled, then produced a book from the satchel slung at his side. “I was due to return this to Luís, and he also happened to call me earlier—”

“It’s not really an emergency yet,” Raúl said, a little too quickly. He invited Thuram in to buy some time so he could compose himself, then signaled to Silva to go watch the back doorway while Thuram’s back was turned. Then he straightened up just before Thuram’s eyes fell on him again. “For all that we know, it could only be rumors.”

Thuram nodded thoughtfully, then lifted one hand. “I apologize, but what could be rumors?”

Raúl blinked.

“Luís did not give me much information,” Thuram added after a moment. He smiled apologetically at Raúl’s chagrin. “He only asked if I had some time free, because you would like a second opinion on a supernatural occurrence.”

“Oh.” Then again, Raúl had to take back all of his complaints about Luís’ ability to discreetly convey a message. And had to reassess just how much Thuram might already know, since apparently the man had hurried over of his own accord. “Well, thank you for coming so quickly.”

“You’re welcome.” Thuram paused, then glanced at the book that was still in his hand. He laid it down on a nearby table and then looked calmly but expectantly back up at Raúl.

They just needed to get out of the shop, Raúl decided. Once that was out of the way and he didn’t have to worry about any accidental meetings, then he could figure out some sort of story. “Do you have time to come with me?” he asked, pointing towards the door. “I think it’ll be easier to explain if we go…”

“As it happens, I am free this evening.” A faint crease developed in Thuram’s brow and he seemed about to comment further. Then he sighed to himself, shook his head and looked again at Raúl. “But I do not have my tools with me, if you think that any action would be necessary.”

“Oh, no, I don’t think so. Not yet. Right now we’re just trying to find out if there’s anything—but it might be better if Kaká didn’t come. I don’t mean any offense, but he’d gotten a reputation around town and some of the demons we might see might not want to talk with him around,” Raúl replied. He glanced through the shop-windows, but didn’t see anyone out on the street; Kaká usually preferred not to come inside if the visit was to be a short one.

Thuram caught him looking and a half-rueful, half-stern expression came over the man’s face. “He has not accompanied me tonight, so even though I believe that his behavior would not put your acquaintances at risk, you needn’t worry about his effect on them.” That odd trace of concern came back, softening Thuram’s rather reproachful tone. “To be truthful, I suspect he’s out on his own business. He missed an appointment with me tonight…but he told me earlier that he would be preoccupied with Andriy, so that is not entirely surprising.”

“Oh.” Raúl knew he shouldn’t have said that, and not in that tone. He also knew he needed to say something quickly to rationalize his reaction, or to at least distract Thuram from it, but he—couldn’t think of anything. This wasn’t what he _did_. He might be a demon but that didn’t mean he automatically knew how to do everything that people thought was immoral, and anyway, he didn’t spend his time working on people. He spent his time taking care of his tribe.

And he wasn’t doing a much of a good job of it, judging from the curious look Thuram was giving him. Raúl gave himself a hard shake and opened his mouth to say that they were leaving.

“What was that?” Thuram asked him. Then the man turned and stared towards the back of the room, where some sort of scuffle was going on. He frowned and his hand went into his pocket. “Is someone fighting?”

“I don’t…know.” Silva should’ve been there, but when Raúl looked over, the doorway was empty. Then Raúl heard Silva’s voice in the hallway just beyond. The other fox-demon seemed to be upset with someone—and then Silva let out a high, startled yip that abruptly broke off.

Raúl went forward a few steps, only to whip around when he heard a creak behind him. Then he froze in horror, but only for a second. Because he remembered Thuram, and the moment he did he spun around and put himself between the priest and Pep. “ _Don’t_ ,” he snapped. “Don’t or I swear you’re not leaving here alive.”

* * *

The café was small and dark, and not at all trendy. It was mostly empty and the few other people who occupied it looked to be people who frequented the place because it was in the neighborhood before considerations such as the quality of the coffee or the atmosphere. The coffee itself was quite good, but the place offered little else; the limited selection was likely due to the fact that the café had a single person, an old man with a bent back, to manage it.

“Stop staring at everything already,” Cristiano said. Against the dusty, age-battered exterior, he resembled a piece of decorative foil stuck carelessly up by a passing tourist. Then his eyes narrowed and Ricardo had the uncomfortable suspicion that the demon might have read his thoughts, or perhaps he’d spoken out loud by accident. “And stop acting like you’re too good to talk to me all of a sudden.”

“I’m not—I didn’t—” Then Ricardo sighed. He slumped in his seat, then grimaced and made an effort to straighten up. He might be confused and frustrated, and considerably more uncertain of himself and of other matters than he cared to be, but wallowing in it would hardly help. “I’m sorry. This is difficult.”

Cristiano shrugged and stirred his cream into his coffee, then licked the spoon before setting it back on his saucer: his tongue was long and thin and black, like the tongue of a snake, and Ricardo briefly stiffened before realizing that no one else had the proper angle to have seen that. “It’s not difficult. You and Andriy had a fight, and now you’re pissed off at him,” Cristiano said. “What was it over?”

Ricardo didn’t immediately reply. He was beginning to regret noticing Cristiano to his problems with Andriy, and not merely because of the fact that Cristiano was a demon. “A disagreement. I’m not ‘pissed off’ at him. It’s only—”

“You’re being more of a pain in the ass about this than you are about me talking about my work,” Cristiano muttered, rolling his eyes. He drank some of his coffee, then raised his brows at Ricardo’s questioning look. “A disagreement over _what_?”

“I don’t think I should provide details. It’s…it may be something he prefers not to speak about with others, and I should respect that.” Ricardo absently twisted his own cup between his hands, only to be painfully alerted to his fidgeting when some steaming coffee lapped over the rim and splashed his fingers. He bit down on his hiss and jerked his hands away. Then he got the paper napkin out from between the cup and the saucer, and twisted it around his scalded fingers.

Ignoring him, Cristiano let a bored stare wander around the room. It crossed the shop-window at the same moment that a statuesque blonde woman was passing by it, and temporarily brightened. Then it returned to Ricardo. Cristiano sighed. “I don’t know why I bother buying you coffee.”

“I appreciate that you do,” Ricardo said. He caught himself wrenching at the napkin and pried it off his hand. The skin underneath was a little pink, but didn’t look in serious danger of blistering; at least he was competent enough to handle himself in a café. Barely. He grimaced, then pulled at his left shoulder for no reason except that it gave him a reason to avoid Cristiano’s disparaging gaze.

“Well, if he’s leaving, we’re all going to find out about it anyway. Sorry, but neither of you really get a say in that. He’s too big of a deal, and everybody’s going to try and keep track of him no matter what he does,” Cristiano replied, his tone more than a little biting. Something outside the shop attracted his attention and he half-twisted to look at it. Then he shrugged it away and slouched back to look appraisingly at Ricardo. “Okay, fine, it won’t count if I guess what’s wrong. He’s leaving and given that you were with me this morning and didn’t say any—”

“If you guess, it doesn’t count?”

Cristiano rolled his eyes. “Look, you wanna think of a better way to do this, be my guest. But you were wandering around in that church looking to blast somebody and I’m shocked it didn’t end up to be me, but I’m not about to let you go off and have it be somebody else. Okay?”

“I wasn’t looking for a fight,” Ricardo protested. But he was dropping his eyes to the table between them even as he spoke. Lilian had spoken to him enough about the dangers of letting his temper and his internal turmoil affect their missions—he wished, briefly, that he was speaking with Lilian now.

It wouldn’t be any less difficult a conversation, he reminded himself. Even if Lilian’s approach was far less abrasive than Cristiano’s, both of them insisted on a blunt honesty that, while ultimately good for Ricardo, was never easy to accept. And because of that, both of them inspired a good deal of guilt in him for not being so welcoming himself of the truth. That a demon felt more comfortable than he did in being honest told him many things that…

“So he obviously didn’t talk to you about this whole leaving idea, since you didn’t bring it up this morning,” Cristiano continued, making Ricardo look back up. “And you don’t like this idea. Right so far?”

Ricardo didn’t nod or otherwise gesture, but he had to admit his will lacked enough resolve to completely hide his emotions.

“And he doesn’t care.”

“He didn’t—” Ricardo bit his lip, then slid down his chair a little “—I don’t know. I can’t tell if he ever cares what I think about what he does. But he must on some level. He listened to me when I asked him to stay. I know—at least, I can see how difficult doing that is for him, but—but I thought—”

“That you could keep an eye on him better?” Cristiano asked. “At least you wouldn’t have to ask me to find the bastard again.”

Ricardo looked sharply at Cristiano at the name-calling; Cristiano merely grinned. Then Ricardo shook his head and looked away. “It’s not only about my knowing where he is. I…yes, it’s some certainty for me, but it isn’t about my desires. And it shouldn’t be. It’s about—”

“Why the fuck not?” When Ricardo looked at him, Cristiano pushed himself forward till he was leaning halfway across the table. He grabbed Ricardo’s leg wrist, yanking Ricardo towards him. “Why shouldn’t it be about what you want? And don’t give me that selfish bullshit. Just saying that it’s not about you isn’t enough to _make_ it not about you. He went to Hell for you. You’re not going to get rid of that by ignoring it.”

“And that’s exactly why I’m _not_ ignoring it,” Ricardo snapped back. He pulled at his wrist, but Cristiano had a surprisingly tight hold on it. “Exactly the opposite. I think about that every time I…”

“Every time you try to figure out whether he _really_ likes you, or is just faking?” Cristiano drawled sarcastically. Then he let go of Ricardo’s arm and settled back in his seat with a deeply satisfied air. He took out his phone, turned it around so that the silver back faced him and then twitched a few strands of his hair while looking at the phone. Once he was done, he put the phone away and pivoted out of his seat, then gestured with exaggerated motions for someone to replace him. “Hey, we were just getting to the good part, but I’ve got to go. Have fun.”

Ricardo jerked stiffly upright and his eyes fell on Andriy standing by the table. His mouth dropped slackly out of its purse—he’d been ready to curse Cristiano into staying, but now all words failed him.

“You’re going,” Andriy said flatly, to Cristiano. Andriy had found a suit from somewhere, a dusty white, wrinkled one that echoed through Ricardo’s memory. He had his hands in his pockets and when the outlines of his knuckles shifted under the cloth, both Ricardo and Cristiano’s eyes went to them. But he only stared at Cristiano. “How far?”

Cristiano blinked sharply. He was perfectly still for a moment, his hands poised with one to brush at his clothes and the other curling to twist a tendril of magic to life in its hollow. Then he shrugged. Both of his hands curled, and Ricardo just glimpsed a thin film slide over Cristiano’s eyes, like the protective third eyelid of a snake. “Far enough. I’m just friends with him, you know.”

“I do.” Andriy hunched his head while swiping a hand back through the hair on the left side of his head. It should have been an awkward, weak-looking movement, but the power that collected almost casually in its wake made Ricardo look for a blow that never came.

After another moment, Cristiano glanced down, laughing to himself. He wasn’t ceding ground by bowing his head; on the contrary, he clearly didn’t feel the need to protect himself. He waved at his empty chair again, then turned his back on Andriy.

Ricardo had half-risen without realizing it, pressing his hands down on the table, and at that his fingernails snapped into the table so hard that he looked down at the bursts of pain in his fingertips. Then he looked back up.

Cristiano had left. The rest of the café was free of anyone—any witnesses, Ricardo thought at first—even the old man who ran the place. Andriy gazed after Cristiano for a few seconds, with power swirling dark around his feet. Then he glanced down at the floor. His brows rose, as surprised as anyone else would be to see the magic there, and then he straightened and looked at Ricardo and it was gone. And the edge to him that had been there, the edge that had come of thousands of years of being whittled back by war, that had gone too, and he was looking at Ricardo with that mild, melancholy air of his.

“I’m sorry,” Andriy said. “You seem to enjoy his company.”

“I.” Ricardo breathed out, then in, and for a moment the world blurred as the oxygen rushed into his lungs and then into his blood. Then he finished standing up. A strange noise came from him and then he understood that it was a laugh. “That wouldn’t be the word I’d use. But I do talk to him. And I—”

“You can see him whenever you want. Except now.” Andriy brushed the hair out of his face again, only for even more strands to fall into his eyes. He looked as if he’d slept in his suit and then walked miles in it, along the dirt roads of some backcountry part of Brazil. “I need to speak to you, and I don’t want him to hear for once.”

A wave of horrified embarrassment washed through Ricardo. He hadn’t been trying to hide his encounters with Cristiano, but he’d been relieved enough that Andriy had offered no reason or opportunity to mention them, and he’d had no idea that Andriy had found out anyway. And then a sharp flush of anger filled him, incomprehensible but vicious and compelling. “I thought we already spoke.”

“No. I spoke. And then you spoke. It’s not the same,” Andriy said patiently, imperturbably, as composed and ignorant of Ricardo’s struggles as always.

“It’s not, but it’s what you should want. It’d be easier for you,” Ricardo snapped. Then he hissed to himself. He glanced around again, half-hoping to find someone else, to have some sort of interruption, but all he saw was the same airless vacuum that always rose up around them. And now that he was breathing, he wanted to keep breathing. “You can go.”

A flicker of something crossed Andriy’s face. He was quiet for a while, looking at Ricardo, and somehow his gaze made Ricardo want to strike him.

“I don’t need you. I wanted to—I want to help you, but you have to follow your own wishes,” Ricardo said after a moment. He thought it would ease some of the strain between them, but each word only seemed to wind the tension more tightly. He shifted his weight and was shocked to see that they were still standing with nearly a meter between them. “I will wait for you. But I don’t—I don’t understand and I don’t think that you understand what leaving would accomp—”

“What are you waiting for?” Andriy asked. His voice had risen slightly. He moved towards Ricardo a little, then stopped when Ricardo stiffened. Then he deliberately moved forward again. “What do you think will come, if you wait long enough?”

“I want—”

“I want to know that I have a reason to be,” Andriy said. He paused. “It’s been a long time. Long enough so that I didn’t know what it was when I saw you, and—”

Ricardo spat out the words so forcefully that he overbalanced and had to catch himself against the table. “I am _not worth_ that.”

Andriy was silent again. His gaze ran over Ricardo from head to foot, and then again, searching and searching and it was worse, that sympathy in it, than when he looked at Ricardo and didn’t understand.

“I’m not worth what you’ve done. You saved me when I had done nothing to deserve it, and everything to earn my end,” Ricardo went on heavily, leaning on the table. “I—even if I tried for the rest of my life, I wouldn’t be able to pay you back. I wouldn’t be that reason.”

“You aren’t now,” Andriy said. He lifted his hand a little, but drew it hesitantly back when Ricardo looked sharply up at him. Instead he pressed his fingers to his lips, then dragged them down to push at his jaw. “When I saw you. I was serving a cause I hadn’t believed in for so long that I didn’t care that I didn’t believe in it. I didn’t think there was another choice. But I saw you, and then I thought to ask myself if that was true. But you aren’t the answer to that question.”

For a while Ricardo couldn’t respond. He gulped at the air a few times; his chest had clenched as if a torrent of freezing water had been poured down his throat. He rubbed his hand over the side of his face, then stood back from the table. Then he almost sat down, but instead settled for twisting both hands about the top of the chair.

“I thought you loved me,” Ricardo said. He didn’t think his voice would be as steady as it was.

“I do,” Andriy said.

Ricardo ripped his hands off the chair as he stood up, and the chair fell over to clatter violently. He winced at the noise, then twisted his right hand around his left wrist. He didn’t look up at the calm voice answering him. “Then what—what do you want?”

“I had to think.” Then Andriy let out a soft, amused noise, like the withering of a chuckle. “I had to remember how to think. It has been a very long time…I love you. I look at the dawn, and remember Heaven, and then I look at you, and remember that I have learned to do without it. I understand, when I see you, why people become so attached to this earthly plane that they could forget about the others. And I see you and I think I could live here as well. I believe that that is love for me.”

“Then why are you leaving?” Ricardo asked. His voice cracked and rasped. He could feel the bones of his wrist grinding in his grip.

“Because I know that I love you but that is not something I _do_ , or something I live. It is…simply what it is. And I still need something else,” Andriy replied after a moment, slow and careful. “I came back. If I had only wanted to only love you, then there’s no reason why death wouldn’t have been sufficient. The last thing I saw was you, and I took that with me. But I am here again, and I need a reason.”

Ricardo bit his lip. He swallowed down his first reply, and then his second because it was the same as the first. He kept wrenching at his wrist.

“I thought you were the reason at first, because I confused the two things,” Andriy continued. He offered up a wry, regretful smile. “I am sorry for that. But I had to think, till I did know that the one was—”

The third time Ricardo couldn’t swallow it. “I want you to stay.”

Andriy blinked. The planes of his face smoothed and he gazed at Ricardo with that damnable calm. He understood what Ricardo was saying—he _understood_ , and even if he was an angel and he felt things differently from Ricardo, he had to see also that Ricardo…that Ricardo was _not_ calm over this.

“I don’t want you to go. I want you to stay with me, and…and I don’t know what next, but I want to see,” Ricardo choked out. His hand was numb, and his throat felt as if phantom fingers were squeezing the life out of it. “I don’t see how you can go. There’s been so much—”

“And that’s why I should go. I don’t enjoy the trouble that comes, and I think that not knowing what to do only makes it seem more…pointless. If I knew what it is that I should do now, then I might be able to accept the problems. But without some reason, I don’t know why I should tolerate them,” Andriy said.

It was eminently reasonable, what he was suggesting. Lilian would have approved. And yet Ricardo couldn’t even bring himself to continue to meet Andriy’s gaze. “I—I don’t—”

“It would be easier for you as well,” Andriy added quietly.

“I don’t see why staying with me can’t be your reason. Even if it wasn’t before, it could be now. I want it to be—yes, that’s self-centered but that’s also the truth.” Ricardo dragged his hand off his wrist, nearly twisting that joint apart, then took a step back. Then a step forward. He stared at Andriy, his pulse pounding brutally in his head, the rasp of his breath the loudest sound in the room. “It’s not easy! It’s not. I’m trying, but I don’t understand, and then you tell me—you _tell_ me you love me but you—”

“You don’t think you need me,” Andriy said.

Ricardo exhaled. The force of it drained him and left him weak, and for a moment he wavered. Then something dark and furious rushed into the void and he saw his arms go up—he felt the cloth of Andriy’s suit-coat under his fingers, and then Andriy’s breath on his face, and the world spiraled out to leave him in the dark.

* * *

“I was not,” Thuram said in a soothing, deliberate tone, “Planning to cause trouble.”

Pep frowned at the man, wrapping his arms around himself. He scratched at his shoulder, then let his left arm swing free as he looked at Raúl. “Is this the priest Luís mentioned?”

“This is Father Thuram,” Raúl said after a long moment. Behind Pep he could now see a nervous, grim-faced Xavi, who signaled quickly that Pep had just barged past him. Given the way Pep and Hierro had arrived, Raúl should have been pleased that they were showing a growing interest in the earthly plane, but he couldn’t help wishing that they’d just limited it to Luís. It would be easier on his nerves. “Nobody’s here to make trouble.”

“I believe you’re Guardiola,” Thuram went on. He bowed slightly from the waist, then adjusted his glasses. “I’ve read about you.”

Raúl stiffened. He’d done some research himself and none of the references that Thuram had probably seen had anything good to say about the fox lords. And none of them had had the full story either, but even if they had, Raúl had to admit that it didn’t look particularly good from the humans’ point of view.

“What did you read?” Pep asked after a pause. He looked thoughtful, but Raúl knew him well enough to spot the warning signs. He still wasn’t as strong as he used to be, but he could give Thuram a hard time.

If that came up, and that wasn’t. Not if Raúl had anything to say about it; he’d fought too hard and for too long to see everything collapse back to the old, awful days. “We’re not interested in the war anymore, or in even really bothering with people.” Raúl turned so that his back was mostly to Thuram, then began to edge towards the man. It wasn’t that he necessarily trusted Thuram more—though he could see the wondering in Pep’s eyes—but that he knew Thuram had a strong preference for only fighting defensively. “We just want to have our own lives. We haven’t caused any trouble yet and we’re not going to, so long as nobody gives us trouble.”

Pep glanced at Raúl again, an odd expression crossing his face. It was something like a cross between curiosity and irritation. Then Pep blinked and looked back at Thuram with deceptive mildness. “Never mind. You’ve done exorcisms so I suppose you’ve read about the—”

“The massacres, yes,” Thuram finished. He adjusted his glasses again, then took them off and began to polish them with his sleeve. “You were very active, and then you dropped out of sight around the end of the Enlightenment. It was presumed that you’d been killed.”

A flicker of irony went through Pep’s eyes. “I disobeyed orders and was imprisoned in Hell.”

Thuram took a moment to absorb that. He put his glasses back on. “May I ask the reason?”

“Does any of that matter anymore?” Raúl asked, half-turning to look at him. “It didn’t concern you. And it just matters now that we’re not going to hurt—”

“Raúl, he was speaking to me,” Pep interrupted. His tone was still low but it was firm and when Raúl turned around, Pep wasn’t even looking at him, but at Thuram. “I wasn’t going to throw my tribe at a plan that wouldn’t work and would get them all killed. I suppose it also worked to spare humans, but to be honest that was never a consideration for me.”

After a moment, Thuram nodded and looked down, steepling his fingers and pressing them against his mouth. He stood in thought for a few seconds before raising his head. “And is that still your approach to matters?”

“It—” Pep started.

“It doesn’t _matter_ ,” Raúl said fiercely. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Pep’s shocked, disapproving look, but he turned his shoulder to it and concentrated on Thuram. “It doesn’t matter what he did then. You can’t bring back the dead. What you do is protect the living, and we’re not going to hurt them, and that doesn’t depend on what he says.”

Then Raúl caught himself. He started to wince—he hadn’t meant it to sound like that—and then he stopped himself from doing that as well. He could feel the way Pep was staring at him and he braced his shoulders against it; he hadn’t meant to say that, but now that it was out…he meant it.

“Isn’t he a leader of yours?” Thuram asked, looking at Raúl. “I apologize if the question is silly, but I am not well-informed as to your internal affairs.”

“Apparently I’m not either,” Pep muttered.

“He is, but—but it’s not like it used to be,” Raúl said. “It’s not about following orders now. We came up here to live, not to fight, and we all agreed to do that and that’s what I’ve been working to do ever since I got here. And what I’m going to keep working to do. I’m not going to fight, and I’m not going to let anybody force us into it. Whoever they are.” He finally turned around to brave Pep’s reaction. “I’m sorry. It’s just—it’s not what we are now, and I think we’re better that way.”

Pep looked…surprised. That was about all Raúl could read off him; he was much more guarded since his return, understandably. It did sting a little, compared to how open he’d been before, but that was the past too, Raúl reminded himself. He could live with a little more mistrust as long as everyone was here and was alive.

Thuram cleared his throat, then smiled apologetically when Raúl started and twisted sharply back around. “I understand that my opinion may have little to no weight among you, but I find that to be an admirable goal.” Then he looked at Pep. “I also deplore some of your past actions towards my kind, but from my experience of punishments, they often cause suffering beyond their remit. I generally prefer to leave such things to wiser heads than myself.”

“But you’ll defend against any threats, I take it,” Pep finally said.

“I would,” Thuram nodded.

Pep nodded too. “I’ve had a lot of time to think, and I’ve come to the conclusion that it wasn’t only a stupid battle plan, but that the entire system is misguided. I don’t intend to participate in it again, and I no longer want to further its goals. I’m happy to leave people alone for the most part. But I can’t promise that I wouldn’t use a given tactic in the future, because there _are_ still things I want to protect.”

“Then I will take the subject up with you again at that point,” Thuram said agreeably. He spent a moment studying Pep’s expression, then nodded to himself. Then he took a deep breath and turned to Raúl. “I apologize for the interruption. Now, we were discussing this possible threat?”

“I.” Raúl took a few deep breaths himself, and still didn’t know how to answer the man. He rubbed at his nose, pulled it, and then glanced at his hand. He probably wasn’t dreaming.

“Oh, there’s one other thing,” Thuram abruptly said. He was looking at Pep again. “My concerns are not only for humans, although they are my main focus, due to selfish self-interest. But I do also think that most beings should have the chance to live in peace, if that’s possible without imposing on another, and so I would defend a demon’s right as well if I thought it was appropriate.”

Pep blinked, then suddenly grinned. “I like you,” he said. “I see why Luís lends you books. So, what’s going on—Raúl?”

“I’ll be right back,” Raúl said.

He wasn’t completely irresponsible; as Raúl went out, he waved Xavi in so that the other fox-demon could keep an eye on the two of them. But Raúl needed—he needed to sit, and push at his temples, and breath out a lot. And that wasn’t going to help figure out what Cristiano was up to, so he was going to get out of the way to do it so he didn’t slow everyone else up. He went to the kitchen.

* * *

“Don’t grab me,” Andriy said, when Ricardo opened his eyes.

They were still in the café, only Ricardo was lying on top of the bar and Andriy was perched on one of the bar chairs, sitting on the chair’s top with his feet on the chair seat. Somehow Andriy made it look natural, and not at all as if he was toying with gravity.

“I let you, sometimes,” Andriy went on. “But sometimes I…the old habits are still there, even with you. I spent most of my…my past life hurting people like you.”

After a moment, Ricardo pushed his arm back and tried to sit up. He must not have been out for very long, because he wasn’t that sore, but the wooden bar was hard and he grunted as his spine pressed into its unforgiving surface. “Is that why you think you have to go? Because you’ll hurt me?”

“I’ll hurt you whether I stay or not.” Andriy gave him a thin shadow of a smile. It was not amused or malicious, but simply acknowledging his certainty in his words. “I want to go because I’ve been here long enough to know that this isn’t where I’ll know what I need to do.”

“I love you,” Ricardo blurted out. He thought he saw Andriy flinch and rolled over onto his side to face the angel. “Stay. I—I’ve done this wrong. I didn’t want to be selfish, when you already went to Hell in my place. I wanted to help you first. But I love you, and I want you to stay with me and I want to know what you need to do, too. I want to see it.”

“But I can’t do it here,” Andriy replied, without any change in tone. “This isn’t the place. I have to go.”

Ricardo almost punched the bar in frustration. As it was, he threw himself back down on the bar and stared at the ceiling. He raked his hands back through his hair, then pulled them down to press over his eyes; a few strands still tangled in his finger, then tore loose as he rubbed at his face. “Does it _matter_ to you whether I love you or not? You don’t—love and caring seem to be two completely different things to you.”

“I loved God for a long time. I still do. But I don’t care for Him.” Something touched Ricardo’s elbow, then fluttered away when Ricardo moved his arm. “If you think of caring as whether or not you want to be with someone all the time. I don’t…being in the Host again is not what I decided to choose. You were there. They offered that, and I refused.”

“I _know_ there are bigger and more important matters than me,” Ricardo said savagely. Because he didn’t understand, once again, and because he did in a way. He did enough to see the pettiness of his requests, and yet—he _felt_ the impact of his requests so much more. And that might be because of selfishness, because he wanted to see after his own life, but the right to do that was what he and Lilian fought for. What he believed they were fighting for, sometimes, and what Lilian certainly believed they were fighting for. “I—I’m not going to force you to stay with me. I want you to find what you need. I…I just wish it was me. I’m sorry.”

That touch on his elbow returned, and then turned into a grip on his arm when he finally pushed his hands from his face. Andriy was standing over him and looking down, and when Ricardo made to push himself up, the angel put his hand against Ricardo’s cheek. It stopped him where he was.

“I turned them all down because I love you. But I don’t know what I want to do with you, and that, I think, goes to not knowing what to do now that I’m not fighting,” Andriy said. He smiled again, this time out of amusement. “I thought perhaps I’d know automatically, once I understood that I loved you. So many of you seem to believe that it works that way. But I’m not a person.”

“I don’t think I know either, so I don’t think that matters,” Ricardo muttered. Then he breathed in deeply, and sat up.

He felt Andriy’s hand slide from his face and seized it, more out of instinct than anything else. Then he held it on his lap and stared at it for long enough to know how odd that was, and still he didn’t let it go or say anything to explain himself. Andriy didn’t resist, and either didn’t find it odd or didn’t care; he merely stood and let Ricardo hold it.

“I…if you need to go, then you should go. I want you to be happy, and you’re not here. I can tell that on my own. And I said I’d wait for you. I keep my word,” Ricardo eventually said. Quietly, mostly to himself, trying to think through it. To persuade himself as he thought, ignoring the bitter pain at each word. “But I wa—before you go, I…do you care for me? Do you know? Because I want to think…I want to think that you’ll come back, and that by then I’ll know how to tell you better that I love you.”

“I want to leave, but I can’t yet. You need me.” Andriy appeared to be a little perplexed himself; his brow furrowed and he spoke more slowly and with more deliberation. “I thought about going this morning, because that was when I finally understood it all. But…I don’t like the idea of going when someone is depending on me. Which is new too.”

Ricardo breathed a little more easily for a moment. Then he frowned. “I don’t understand when you say that I need you. I’m not arguing—but we haven’t talked before this much, so how do you…”

“Because you do tell me. Not in words, but when…” And then Andriy reached up and touched Ricardo’s cheek again.

He only rested his fingertips against it, letting them rise against Ricardo’s gasp and slow exhale. Ricardo stared at him, at his steady gaze and stillness that almost ached in its utter silence. Then, carefully, as carefully as he’d move with a frightened animal, Ricardo raised his hand. He thought Andriy would move away but instead the angel held still as Ricardo wrapped his own hand around Andriy’s wrist.

After a moment, when Andriy still hadn’t moved, Ricardo put his free hand out. He meant to touch Andriy’s cheek, but the bar was too high and he had to bend down. And then he lost his balance so that his hand went to Andriy’s shoulder and his face dipped right into the angel’s warm breath. He stiffened, then closed his eyes and abruptly pressed forward, in a wild spasm of—he didn’t care. He’d been so afraid to put a foot wrong and now that it seemed like that didn’t matter, like that the worst would happen no matter what he did, he didn’t care to be careful anymore.

Somehow he stayed on the bar, and Andriy’s hand stayed on his cheek. Andriy took his fierce, desperate kiss without moving, and a sudden, vicious urge to kill the angel rose in Ricardo. It stole his breath and he froze.

He would have moved back, terrified at himself, except that Andriy’s hands were on his waist and holding him in place. And then Andriy pulled him off the bar—he stumbled when his feet hit the floor—and pushed him hard back against the bar, and kissed him as fervently, as all-consuming and possessive, as when the angel had ripped his sin from him without asking. He crumpled under the assault, his knees giving way, and slid till the bar caught him roughly under the left elbow.

The impact jarred some strength into him and he pushed down on his arm, pressed it back across the bar to hook his hand over the edge. His nails drove into the wood as Andriy dragged his mouth across Ricardo’s lips, burning them open. He felt something hot move in his mouth and he didn’t know what it was or what it was doing, but the twist of it made his head spin. A hand stroked up his side, then down his right upper arm, fingers pressing his flesh into the palm. He struggled to breathe and wasted the air groaning when Andriy slid his hand inside Ricardo’s collar, fingers cool and smooth against the flushed skin of Ricardo’s throat, the beads of sweat starting to spring up at Ricardo’s temple.

Ricardo was crumpling his hand over and over again around a wad of Andriy’s suit-coat. He felt his own coat slip off one shoulder, and then his collar loosened. Andriy’s fingers cupped around the curve of the base of his throat. The thumb brushed lower, dusting across Ricardo’s breast just above where Ricardo’s heart was beating furiously against its bony cage. Then Andriy wrapped his hand over Ricardo’s shoulder, under Ricardo’s shirt, his thumb sliding up the bobbing gorge of Ricardo’s throat to prop up the chin as he kissed Ricardo again, more deeply. Somehow more deeply, when it already felt as if he’d stolen every last part of Ricardo’s soul.

Then, as softly and cruelly as the fall of the first snow, Andriy drew back. He ran his hand along Ricardo’s cheekbone twice, the second time drawing it around Ricardo’s ear to tuck away a few strands. “You tell me,” he said.

“I love you.” Ricardo coughed; his mouth was dry, his words clumsy on his tongue. He pulled at Andriy with one hand, then brought the other around to wrap around the tail of Andriy’s coat because his fingers were shaking too much to simply seize it. “I want you. I love you. And I want you to—I want you to not regret that you fell in love with me.”

Then he pushed his head forward, closing his eyes. He almost expected it to hurt, and when it didn’t, when Andriy met his mouth with gentleness, his eyes snapped back open. He shuddered, then jerked his head away and looked down.

Something bumped his brow. He grimaced, then breathed out slowly as Andriy leaned his head against Ricardo’s. His eyes nearly shut again when the angel stroked a thumb down the line of his jaw. “I want you to stay with me. I know—not now. But—can—”

Andriy kissed the corner of Ricardo’s mouth. He carded his hand through Ricardo’s hair, and even though Ricardo had more he wanted—had to say, he couldn’t help raising his head into the touch. His lower lip caught against Andriy’s mouth and then he had to kiss the angel, and Andriy dropped his hand inside Ricardo’s collar again. He traced the line of Ricardo’s collarbone and the drag of his fingertips, the shift of Ricardo’s shirt around them, it nearly made Ricardo drop again.

“I love you,” Ricardo said against Andriy’s skin. “I love you. I want—I want—”

He couldn’t finish with words. He pulled at Andriy, clumsily, and nearly panicked when his hands unexpectedly swung towards his hips. Because they were full of Andriy’s coat and Andriy had shrugged that off, and now he was pulling Ricardo’s shirt open, dragging it down Ricardo’s arms. His fingers swept over Ricardo’s bare shoulders and Ricardo jammed himself back against the bar.

Andriy looked up at him. Once, not asking, and then Andriy dropped his eyes and his mouth was on Ricardo’s and his hands were slipping down Ricardo’s trousers. Ricardo twisted and jerked again, the edge of the bar banging across his spine, but Andriy ignored it, palms sliding around Ricardo’s hips and then cupping—time skipped. The air was cool on the front of Ricardo’s legs and the wood of the bar was skin-warm against their backs, and Andriy was—was touching him, and he wasn’t ignorant, he knew what would happen but he was gasping, his hands still clenched in Andriy’s coat, still trying to tell the angel.

Then Andriy was pushing him back onto the bar, so far back that he thought his spine would break, except that at the last moment Andriy grabbed under his right knee and swung up his legs. And then they were lying on the bar and Ricardo had dropped the coat, but his mind was still stuttering and didn’t tell his hands what to do. They were on Andriy’s shoulders and then on the angel’s sides, and then gripping the bar as Andriy’s mouth tracked up the side of his neck, as Andriy’s hands pressed his thighs, and it wasn’t some smooth crescendo, sliding upward. It was jerky and shuddering, as if Ricardo was being pulled along by a string and as if he didn’t want to go, and when he did. When he did so badly that he couldn’t breathe.

But it was—it was—all his training, everything that he’d thought he was going to be, everything he knew about the world and about himself. Had thought he’d known. It was hard, like Andriy said. They didn’t go away so easily.

He breathed. Andriy let him breathe. The angel’s head hung just above his own, but Andriy was looking down and Ricardo could only glimpse a sliver of eye beyond a fringe of lashes. He felt what Andriy was doing and he flinched again, then twisted his hands against Andriy’s back. His mouth opened.

Something wrenched his back up and his head slammed down into the bar. He hissed and the world went black and then returned. He’d blinked. He hissed again and Andriy ran a hand down his cheek and he caught himself snarling. He hurt and he didn’t and he knew what they were doing and he knew why, and for some reason he wanted to hit Andriy again. And then it passed, that bizarre insane flash, and he was wrapping himself around the angel, desperate for more. He pulled so hard at Andriy that he nearly rocked the angel over his head, before Andriy pinned down his hips and showed him how that wasn’t needed. And he let his head fall back on purpose, and dragged at Andriy’s back, and now he was making them go. Trying to, trying to push them forward but Andriy didn’t want to go with him, it seemed. And this was why Ricardo wanted to hurt him, because—because—

And it all broke at once.

* * *

“Raúl?”

After his start, Raúl settled back at the kitchen table. He pulled his arms off the top, then put them back and propped his elbows there while he rubbed at his face. “We’ve never really discussed it. I actually don’t know what the others think,” he said. He started quietly but his voice immediately began to rise and he didn’t mean it to. “I just—”

“You said what you thought,” Pep finished, pulling out the chair to Raúl’s left. He sat down and was silent for a moment. Then he drummed his fingers against the table. Then he stopped that, shifted in his chair, and sighed. “I’ve been away for a while.”

“Which wasn’t your fault.” Raúl pressed his fingers into the sides of his nose, then braced himself to lift his head and look at the other demon.

He froze when Pep laughed. Then he jerked his head up to stare, and found Pep still snorting as the demon rubbed his mouth. Eventually Pep noticed and sobered, and even…looked regretful?

“I try not to blame myself for being tortured over refusing to turn you all over to a massacre,” Pep said, a trace of humor lingering in his voice. Then he pursed his lips. He opened his mouth, pressed his hand against it, and then put his hand on the table. “I know I’ve been—and it would be ridiculous to think that things wouldn’t change in the meantime. It’d be ridiculous if things _didn’t_ change. If they’d been perfect before I was detained, I wouldn’t have felt the need to do what I did. And you wouldn’t have felt the need to speak out just now.”

“It’s not that we don’t still look up to you,” Raúl said after a long moment. “We want you here, and we want you to be part of this. It’s just that this, and I’m not trying to—this isn’t the war, and this isn’t _any_ war, it’s so many different things because there are so many of us and we each—but—”

“I’m not angry with you.” Pep briefly looked away. He pressed his hands palms-down against the table and inhaled deeply and slowly. Then he exhaled, slumping back in his seat, and looked back at Raúl. His brows rose and fell. “I’m sorry for making you think I would be. I…near the end I wasn’t everything I would have liked to be.”

Raúl rolled his eyes, was shocked at himself, and then somehow found it funny; he was probably spending too much time with Cesc and Villa. “I’m going to hit you if you apologize for saving us again.”

“Because you’re free to do that now,” Pep said. A smile flickered at the edges of his mouth, and then it went away and he shook his head. He started to lean forward, paused, and then put out his hand and touched Raúl’s shoulder. “I was away for a long time. And—and I think I just…stopped at some point. Stopped thinking, stopped feeling, stopped…you had to. It was unbearable otherwise. And it feels like I was sleeping, even though I wasn’t, and my head is still so…I’ll be honest, I’m confused. I’m going to do the wrong things for a while, till it stops feeling so unreal, and I just hope you’ll bear with me.”

“I didn’t know what to do. I don’t even know why everybody started asking me what to do after you two—and I told them so, and they’d just keep asking. And we had to do something, so I tried to do what I could, and the whole time I kept thinking when you come back. Because that was the only way I could do it.” Then Raúl stopped, a little surprised at himself. He stared at the table.

It had been a long time. And it was funny how it was only just now that he was really feeling that.

“Well, we’re back.” Pep pressed a little harder at Raúl’s shoulder, then dropped his hand. He looked around the room again, with real interest. “And it really is much better up here. Even…that odd man who’s our host…and everyone, they’re fine. You did fine.”

Raúl breathed out hard. Harder than he’d really been expecting; he had to put his hand on the table to steady himself. He heard Pep moving but didn’t look up till Pep’s arm fell over his shoulders. And even then, his head bumped into Pep’s cheek so he stopped himself before he saw Pep’s expression. He stiffened as the other demon settled in by him, then sighed again.

“So what’s going on?” Pep asked after a while. He absently twitched one of Raúl’s ears, then nuzzled it apologetically when Raúl prodded an elbow into him. “Who’s Cristiano? Another human? Do I need to introduce myself at some point?”

“Absolutely not,” Raúl said reflexively. He tried not to grimace so much that he rocked his head off Pep’s shoulder. “He’s an incubus. And we think he’s being evil. Maybe. He’s just incredibly unpleasant.”

Pep was quiet.

Raúl pulled away and looked at Pep. “Where’s Fernando?”

“He’s…” Pep went through chagrin to guilt to deep-seated irritation “…he wanted to see for himself. But this was back when we thought Cristiano might be another mage, possibly an acquaintance of Luís’, so he swore he’d only look into it. I tried to convince him it was better to stay and ask you, but I had to talk him down from just storming out. He’s very frustrated with not being told anything, and I’m sorry, Raúl, but you’re still a poor liar.”

“I know, and I’m sorry, but we weren’t trying to hide things from you. We just didn’t—”

“Want us to accidentally ruin things and I understand. And he’ll understand once I sit him down and—” Pep pressed his lips together. Then he looked up at Raúl, who’d scrambled to his feet. “Or you can tell him, if you’d rather. But I think I’d better be the one to go find him right now, or at least I should go along with whoever does go.”

They were actually going to keep Cristiano from getting hurt. For a moment Raúl wondered—then he shook his head and gave up on that idea, and went to call for the others. Cristiano might be up to no good, but right now Kaká thought he was a friend and the last thing they needed was Kaká trying to avenge Cristiano.

* * *

Cristiano grinned and triumphantly tossed down a crumpled, coffee-stained napkin. “Top that.”

The others stared at it. Nani whistled lowly under his breath, while Deco just looked like somebody had stepped on his foot, as usual. “It doesn’t count if you didn’t do it yourself,” Deco said. “And I don’t see you fucking that priest on a bar.”

“It does too count!” Cristiano snapped. He almost added that if Deco wanted to be that prissy, they could chalk off half the score from his stint in Barcelona, because he hadn’t personally done all of them himself either.

What stopped him, and the rest of them, was the demon who stepped through the doorway. Hierro looked around, a mildly inquisitive expression on his face. He scratched his nose, then tweaked a strand of fur from one ear. “What happened to the statue there?” he asked, jerking his chin up at an empty niche on the wall.

“Riot about a century ago broke it,” Deco said warily. “Can we help you?”

“No.” Hierro just kept standing there and looking around. He didn’t even look that surprised to see them, and Cristiano knew that they’d never met before.

For that matter, Cristiano just knew the demon from woodcuts, which had made Hierro look a lot more heavily-built than he actually was. And what was he doing out anyway? He was supposed to still be freaking out at modern technology and modern human mages telling fox-demons off for not cleaning up their hairballs.

“Soul pool?” Hierro asked, right when Cristiano was starting to think he was senile.

Nani jumped. Cristiano rolled his eyes. “None of your business,” he said. “You’re not in.”

Hierro looked at him, blinked, and then turned around to look at the café across the street. “Fallen One?”

“None of your—” Cristiano started again.

He just dodged getting slammed up against the wall. That fucking Hierro’s claws ripped up his sleeve, sending Cristiano off-balance into Deco. Who was a bastard and nearly shoved Cristiano right back into Hierro’s grip, and Cristiano nearly had to twist himself in two to get away from it. He threw up his forearm to deflect Hierro’s next strike, then jumped backwards.

“Hey!” A little dark shadow zipped between them, then spiked out into Villa. He looked sort of confused for a moment, like he didn’t know what the fuck he was doing. Then he opted for Hierro and looked _really_ like he didn’t know what he was doing. “Hey, hey, wait, you can’t kill him till we—”

Hierro didn’t lunge at him, or at Cristiano, but it didn’t look like the asshole was giving up on the idea. He looked at Villa. “Move.”

Villa shook his head. “No. No, look, Kaká—okay, look, there’s this weirdo priest and he’s kind of a potential nexus, and for some fucked-up reason he likes this asshole—” he jerked a thumb at Cristiano “—and personally, I’d love it if you ate him, but then Kaká might get mad and hunt us all down.”

“I’m not going to eat him,” Hierro sighed. He relaxed his stance and shook his head, and Villa’s shoulders slumped a little. “I’m just going to beat in his skull for bringing a Fallen One here. _Move_.”

Cristiano couldn’t see Villa’s face, but since Villa didn’t move, even when Hierro reached for him, Cristiano assumed that Villa was still trying to process. And everybody else had fucked off suddenly, Cristiano disgustedly noticed. And _shit_ , but Hierro was fast for his size. Where the fuck was Villa—who cared. Cristiano swung away from Hierro’s outstretched hand, only to get swept up by the son of a bitch’s other arm.

He did get his hands up. He took the impact of his back against the wall, and then was going to shove a spell right through Hierro’s eyes when they were suddenly yanked apart. And then Kaká was standing there, one hand under Cristiano’s arm, and a couple meters away Andriy and Hierro were swirling up vortexes of power around each other. Well, this wasn’t going to plan.

* * *

Andriy dressed himself. He put his left arm through his shirt-sleeve and let it hang till the rest of the shirt untwisted. Then he pulled the sleeve up to his shoulder, put his other arm back and hooked it through the other sleeve. Ricardo had never seen the angel dress before, and even though the motions were familiar, the sight as a whole was slightly alien. He almost wanted to say it felt wrong.

He leaned against the bar. He’d pulled on his trousers and his shirt, but hadn’t buttoned either yet; he had his hands wrapped around the halves of his trousers, ready, but the movement of his fingers had felt so clumsy that he’d stopped, and then he’d seen the angel. Still graceful, Ricardo thought idly, when he ached and his limbs were drained of any energy, when his hair stuck to his brow and the back of his neck and his skin was scratchy with half-dried sweat. He wondered why he’d thought it would have felt more…more natural afterward. He wondered that he’d even thought that.

Andriy looked up at him. “I don’t know if I would’ve wanted to love you,” Ricardo said.

He hadn’t meant—he hadn’t been _thinking_. He’d spoken like he breathed, like something that just came by itself.

He had to say more. “I love you. I do. But I don’t know…if I could have chosen, I don’t know if I would have chosen this.”

“It wasn’t a choice,” Andriy said. He stopped for a moment, then went on buttoning up his shirt. “I didn’t choose.”

“I didn’t either, but—but it doesn’t just end once it happens. If I know anything now, it’s that. You have to keep…it keeps going, but only if that’s what you decide to do. Because that is a choice.” Ricardo twisted his hands in his trousers, then angrily finished dressing himself. Buttons caught under his fingernails. He almost ripped off one, but instead the button gave way. “And—and I need you. Yes. But that’s not my choice either. And I don’t even know you. I have to know to know if I…what I want, and I don’t know you. I don’t know who you are.”

“And I don’t know that either.” For a moment Andriy looked as if he was simply going to pick up his coat from the floor. He stooped as if he would, but instead he came over to Ricardo.

When he reached up, Ricardo stiffened. Then Ricardo stiffened again, thinking Andriy would back away, and Andriy cupped his cheek. And some things weren’t choices but they were so…Ricardo closed his eyes and welcomed the kiss.

When they parted, he was the one to say it. “You have to leave. Before I can…but I want to see you again.” Ricardo felt Andriy shift away and grabbed desperately at him, then half-opened his hands. “Tell me I’ll see you again.”

Instead Andriy put his hands around Ricardo’s face. He brushed his thumbs over Ricardo’s lips, then leaned in so close that Ricardo parted his lips, thinking…but Andriy breathed in, their mouths nearly but not touching. “I know you,” he said. “And I chose that.”

“I love you,” Ricardo said. He pulled at Andriy again, half-on purpose. “Stay till the morning.”

Andriy drew a breath, as if to answer, and then looked away. He frowned. Then Ricardo felt it too: a ripple of power where there shouldn’t be any. Ricardo instinctively reached for his rosary, only to find his pocket empty.

Before he could panic, it was pressed into his hand. He was still staring at it when Andriy spun on his heel, and he had to hurry to get out ahead of the angel.

* * *

“I don’t care what he offered you, this isn’t his place. Or yours,” Hierro was telling Andriy. His voice was dropping to a growl and his teeth looked to be lengthening, too.

“Stop it! Stop it!” Villa was practically doing jumping-jacks, trying to get their attention. Then his eyes widened and he leaped backward, cannonading into Kaká as he barely avoided Hierro’s swipe. He caught himself against the wall and then just stared at Hierro.

Cristiano was shaking his head and grinning, helping himself up using Kaká’s arm. “You’re way behind, you know. First, he’s not really a Fallen One anymore. Second, I didn’t offer him anything.”

“That doesn’t matter,” Hierro said.

“My business here isn’t your concern,” Andriy said at the same time. He didn’t look particularly interested in the conversation, but his head was up and he had an unusual focus to his eyes. He absently pulled at his rumpled coat. “And his—” he tipped his head towards Cristiano “—isn’t my concern. I would like to pass.”

“We were leaving,” Kaká added tightly. He wasn’t as blatant as the other two in calling up power, but the little flickers around him showed he was having trouble keeping a lid on his temper. And he wasn’t paying nearly enough attention to Cristiano, who seemed to think it was all a giant joke. “Peacefully.”

Hierro’s brows rose. “I don’t believe—”

“Fernando!” hissed Pep, who finally came around the corner and thank everything, because Cesc had just been about to give up and jump down himself. “Fernando, _stop_.”

Something almost lashed out from Hierro at Andriy, but at the last moment Hierro restrained himself. It was rough on him and he rocked on his feet. Then he turned angrily on Pep. “He was one of them! You might not remember yet but I do and—”

Oh, forget it. Cesc wasn’t about to do a Villa and get squashed trying to break up the fight himself, but he couldn’t just sit on the roof-top and watch now. Besides, Kaká was down there and he was supposed to be following Kaká, and he could keep an eye on the human a lot better that way.

He glided down the wall and then peeled off into solidity just as one, Hierro jerked back towards Andriy—who didn’t even bat an eye, or take his hand out of his trouser-pocket—and two, Kaká pushed forward between the other two. Kaká raised his hands with the palms out, which might’ve looked more peaceful if he hadn’t had his rosary wrapped around one. “I don’t know your past history, but this is not the time or the place to fight,” he said. “There are innocent people around and I won’t stand for it.”

Hierro was going to say something nasty in reply, but Kaká had at least stalled him long enough for Pep to get hold of his arm. Now Pep gave that a sharp pull, then stepped up to take Hierro by the waist. “I _remember_.” He pulled at Hierro till the other demon looked at him. “But not here. The man is right. Too many will notice.”

“I am leaving,” Andriy suddenly said. He returned the intense stares with a diffident shrug. “I know what I did. I’m no longer pursuing that or any other cause, and I have no interest in fighting with you now. I will only if you wish.”

Kaká stiffened, then half-spun towards Andriy. His mouth opened and his hand rose, and then he clenched in on himself so hard that it was amazing he didn’t crack a bone.

“But I will not do it here,” Andriy finished. And he didn’t mean geographically, with that nod of his at Kaká.

“I would also advise you to settle your differences elsewhere.” Thuram had come in at some point when they were all distracted with the pissed-off Hierro, and looked ridiculously calm about stepping into an alley with this many angry demons. And then he smiled serenely to boot. “To be perfectly honest, I would prefer a non-violent settlement, and would be happy to offer my services as a mediator. But I merely suggest that—I am aware that I am far too ill-informed at the moment to do more. I do, however, insist on not putting others who aren’t involved in harm’s way.”

Hierro hunched, then straightened up. Then he clicked his teeth together; they went back to human-looking so he could grind them. He started to say something, but Pep hissed something at him and instead Hierro grunted. Then he exhaled irritably and abruptly moved back. He looked at Andriy. “Get out.”

Andriy didn’t take offense. He heard it, but he didn’t really acknowledge it, actually. He just turned around and went towards the end of the alley. Went by Kaká, who stared at Hierro a moment longer before awkwardly twisting to catch at Andriy’s arm.

“It’s still your fight,” Hierro abruptly said.

Both Andriy and Kaká stopped, but weirdly, Hierro seemed to be talking mostly to Kaká.

“It doesn’t matter what he says, or what you say,” Hierro went on, looking at Kaká. “Whatever you do, wherever he is, he’s going to be there, in others’ eyes.” Then he glanced at Thuram. He pursed his lips, then muttered something to Pep and began to walk away.

Pep went with him. Of course Raúl was around, and he came out to talk Villa out of starting a fight with Cristiano and then sent him after Pep and Hierro. Raúl himself stayed to speak quietly with Thuram; he saw Cesc, all right, but he didn’t tell Cesc to do anything, so Cesc figured that he was still on Kaká duty.

The priest hadn’t gone far. He and Andriy were standing in the shelter of an entryway only a few meters from the alley…talking. Kind of. Mostly Kaká was talking, low-voiced and raspy, and then he stopped and put his hands up around Andriy’s face and whoa. Well, they’d finally gotten somewhere.

Kaká’s hands clenched while they were up there, going white-knuckled, but Andriy didn’t push him away. It was Kaká who withdrew first. He breathed in and out, shaking a little, and stared at the ground. After a moment, Andriy slipped around him and started down the steps and Kaká looked up. Andriy paused, like he knew, but he didn’t turn. Then he kept going, till he’d reached the cross-street. He went around the corner and was gone.

For a few more minutes Kaká stood in the entryway. He raked the hair back from his face, then let his hands drop to clasp behind his neck as he opened and shut his eyes. Finally he blew out his breath and sat abruptly down. If the hard impact with the stone steps hurt, he didn’t show it, but Cesc couldn’t help wincing in sympathy.

“I know you’re there,” Kaká suddenly said.

Cesc jumped, then opened his mouth to excuse himself. But then Thuram moved out of the alley and Cesc realized he was still good, and collapsed into a shadow in relief.

Kaká looked like he didn’t want Thuram there, and like he kind of didn’t care. Then he grimaced and looked away. He rubbed his eyes.

“We can speak later,” Thuram offered quietly. “I have no wish to impose on your private affairs.”

“No, it—no, I just…well, I don’t know what to tell you right now.” Kaká looked back up at Thuram, then put his hands down on the step on either side of himself. He snorted, then chuckled under his breath. “I’ve been the one who’s been remiss. I should have spoken to you more…I will, but…but I have to sort it out in my head first, and I’d like to try that by myself first. I’m sorry.”

“There was no need for the apology, Ricardo.” Thuram studied Kaká’s face, then bent forward and briefly clasped the other man’s shoulder. “When you feel that it’s appropriate.”

“Thank you.” It looked like Kaká was going to let Thuram go then, but as Thuram turned away, Kaká cleared his throat. “Wait. There’s—Lilian. I know…we’ll have to talk about this more than I want—than I can at the moment, but I want you to know that—that I think I need to go back to the missions. At least, I…I know you’re enjoying your teaching here, but it’s not…”

Thuram blinked, then adjusted his glasses. He pressed his hands together for a moment, then dusted them slowly over his hips. “I have enjoyed my time here. The classes and my students, and everything…it has been a very good rest. But like yourself, I am not yet at the point in my life where I do not feel a call elsewhere.”

Kaká looked up sharply, then smiled. It was a relieved, brilliant smile, and Cesc could kind of see where Andriy was going with that when Kaká tossed away the sourpuss act. “Have you told the Vatican yet?”

After a moment, Cesc identified the expression on Thuram’s face as embarrassment. Wow. Tonight really was throwing up all sorts of wonders.

“Lilian,” Kaká said, tone weary and affectionate.

“I am planning to. As you say, there is still much to be discussed,” Thuram replied. Kind of primly for him, to be honest.

Kaká grinned and waved Thuram off. As the other man walked down the street, Kaká shook his head, still grinning. Then he straightened his shoulders and sighed, and his face settled back into one of its more familiar disapproving expressions.

“Not all the way back to Brazil, right?” Cristiano sauntered around the corner and then flopped down to sprawl on the steps by Kaká. He frowned at his ripped sleeve, then rolled his eyes and looked up at the sky. “Not that I’ve got anything against Brazil, but you went to some real dumps down there. And Deco would be pissy about it. Hey, you know where would be really great? Sp—”

“Andriy is not going to come when I ask him, much less help you. If I ever did ask him to do that, and I didn’t this time,” Kaká said. Then he rubbed his eyes again. He glanced at Cristiano, then raised his brows. “I’m not perfect, but I’m not entirely oblivious. It helps your standing among your peers a great deal to be able to have that sort of association.”

Cristiano was utterly shell-shocked, and it was a great look on him, and damn it, Cesc kind of loved Kaká right then.

“I haven’t ever asked you to help me out, have I? I didn’t _make_ you stay with him, or talk to me, or any of the other things,” Cristiano finally said. He sat up straight, then shrugged and flipped his hand inquiringly at Kaká. “And I never said I wasn’t also looking out for myself. I haven’t broken any promises.”

“I know.” Kaká pressed his hand against his face again, then appeared to stifle a yawn. Then he shrugged too. He looked levelly at Cristiano. “And for all that, you’ve been…you’ve been helpful, when you didn’t have to be to get what you wanted. So I think we are—I think we understand each other. And thank you.”

“It’s great being your friend too, Ricky, with all the death threats,” Cristiano said dryly. He relaxed back against the steps, and for a while they just sat there. Then he cocked a brow at Kaká again. “But seriously, there’s one more thing you’ve gotta do, and especially if you’re going to run around the boondocks of Brazil again. We have to watch _Buffy_.”

After a moment, Kaká gave up and just stared at Cristiano. “Pardon?”

“It’s this TV show from America,” Cristiano said excitedly. “It’s got this girl who was a cheerleader but now—”

“Yes, I know what it is. One of Thuram’s colleagues teaches a course about misconceptions of the divine and the supernatural as expressed in popular culture.” Then Kaká went back to looking confused. “But why do I have to watch it?”

“Because of the doomed romance! You need long-distance relationship tips, and it’s got a perfect example of what—”

Cesc sloped off his perch and headed home. This clearly wasn’t his problem anymore, and he wanted dinner and wanted to know just how mad Hierro was. The others could look after themselves for a little while.


End file.
